


Fake It 'til You Break It

by evol_love, phonecallfromgod, youshallnotfinditso



Category: The Social Network (2010)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Final Clubs, Friends to Lovers, Gen, M/M, Mistaken for Being in a Relationship, Multi, POV Outsider
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:01:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 36,990
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26515636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evol_love/pseuds/evol_love, https://archiveofourown.org/users/phonecallfromgod/pseuds/phonecallfromgod, https://archiveofourown.org/users/youshallnotfinditso/pseuds/youshallnotfinditso
Summary: In which Mark comes to the conclusion that Eduardo getting into a Final Club is actually great because Mark can be his plus one to reap the rewards, and everyone else comes to the far more logical conclusion that Mark and Eduardo are dating.Or; Six (and a half) times someone found out Mark & Eduardo were dating.
Relationships: Divya Narendra/Cameron Winklevoss, Eduardo Saverin/Mark Zuckerberg, Kirkland Roommates, Minor or Background Relationship(s), Tyler Winklevoss & Cameron Winklevoss
Comments: 37
Kudos: 153





	Fake It 'til You Break It

**Author's Note:**

> We the authors would just like to briefly note that this fic is not an endorsement of any real life counterparts to characters in the film, nor is it in endorsement of Harvard Final Clubs, which suck pretty hard. 
> 
> We would also like to note that viewpoints regarding sexuality expressed in this fic are meant to be a reflection of the character's opinions and not our own.

**5\. Dustin**

“This dorm is a nightmare,” Billy comments as he walks through the common area to leave. 

“It’s _fine,_ ” Dustin says tersely, taking the tape roll from Chris so he can put up the hastily printed photograph of some famous painting of trees over the small (but deep) hole they’d put through the wall a few minutes before. 

He wishes he could say it was the first time he and Chris had wrought havoc on their living space while goofing off in the dorm. He also wishes he could say it was from something much cooler and more athletic than a lightsaber duel involving a golf club someone’s dad gave them as a dorm-warming present and a piece of PVC pipe Dustin had saved from a trash can on the first floor. But here he is now. 

“That looks so tacky,” Chris says scornfully, and a need to defend his grayscale printout of that painting (it’s either Picasso or Van Gogh, he’s about 75% sure) to cover up the evidence of their battle surges through Dustin. 

“ _You_ put the golf club through the wall,” Dustin fires back. 

“Because _you_ can’t be trusted with it anymore after shattering my coffee mug,” Chris says, and yeah, okay, he has a point. 

“I don’t think Mark will even notice,” Dustin says, frowning dubiously at the painting. It’s a standard 8.5 x 11 sheet of copier paper, and the painting is in black and white because _who_ is paying for color printing, but Dustin thinks maybe what it lacks in quality it makes up for in total obscurity. 

“Yeah. It was the best plan,” Chris agrees after a minute. Dustin beams at him; a truce. “Besides, do you think Markpays any attention to detail in this room? I’d bet on him getting another _girlfriend_ before he noticed that.”

Dustin snorts. He feels fidgety suddenly, now that their task is done. It’s like if he doesn’t have some kind of project he can actually feel his body’s motor whirring frantically to find something new. His mom once told him he had a hamster wheel for a brain, or maybe that was Mark. Either way. The only solution is to find something to do, but suddenly it’s as if his mind has been completely wiped clean of every action Dustin has ever known how to do or enjoy. There’s...he could eat a snack? Or he could turn on their microscopic tv and see if there’s anything worthwhile on. Or he could finally suck it up and dig into the stupid Sophomore Economics Tutorial assignment he’s been putting off all week. It’s definitely what he _should_ do. 

So after flipping through the tv guide for five minutes and stealing a handful of Chris’ rice cakes, he settles down with his laptop. 

He’s barely opened his Word doc, though, when he gets the warning message that his computer will be dying in the next ten minutes. Groaning, he shuffles off to Mark and Billy’s room to plug it in (Chris has a whole Thing about him unplugging the alarm clock in their room, because apparently having to reset the time on it is _too much work_ ). Dorm H33 has a lot going for it (friendship, love, a shitload of beer), but enough outlets for all four occupants is not on the list. There’s the outlet in his and Chris’s room, the outlet the tv is plugged into, and the outlet in Mark and Billy’s room. It is genuinely his only hope. It’s not his fault. 

And it’s also not his fault that Mark and Eduardo don’t expect him to be there when they come in, in the middle of some conversation about what they’re doing tomorrow night (It’s cool that he wasn’t invited. Totally cool). Dustin actually _lives_ here unlike Eduardo, who might as well be their fifth roommate even if he refuses to sleep over because “my dorm is right there, guys, seriously, I’m not going to die walking a block away.” It should be a given that Dustin may at any time appear in any given part of the suite. It’s not exactly big enough to hide in. 

He’s about to greet Eduardo happily from where he’s sprawled on Mark’s bed, laptop on his chest, but then he processes the conversation unfolding between him and Mark and he shuts his mouth.

“Oh I, I can’t make it actually,” Eduardo is saying, sounding sheepish and barely making eye contact with Mark anymore. It’s _fascinating._ Dustin pauses typing mid-sentence, cocks his head to the side in curiosity. 

“You don’t do things with people that aren’t us,” Mark says, eyes narrowing. And it’s a very Mark thing to say—it’s not totally accurate and it’s not especially nice—but he does kind of have a point. Eduardo is in their suite more than _Billy_ is, it feels like. He’s in Mark and Billy’s room about as often. 

“Of course I...that’s, whatever, Mark, that’s not the...I have to go to this party at. For The Phoenix.”

“Oh.” 

Dustin loves knowing things, but maybe not enough to have to go through this _again._ Ever since Eduardo got punched, Mark’s been kind of a raging asshole about the whole thing and it’s really starting to influence the feeling of this place. If Dustin ever manages to bring a girl home, she’ll know right away that there’s strife in their suite, and nothing kills the mood like strife, he can’t _handle_ a room with strife in it. It’s like Mark and Eduardo are actively working to make sure he never gets laid. 

“Well, I don’t see why we couldn’t still hang out,” Mark continues. Dustin slaps a hand to his forehead. The fact that they haven’t noticed him yet is amazing. He can’t wait to tell Chris. Once, they took turns flicking Skittles at Mark and Eduardo when they were wrapped up in some heavy discussion to see how many it took for them to notice (fourteen). 

Eduardo winces, that expression he gets when he wants to tell Mark no but he absolutely cannot bring himself to. Dustin’s very familiar with it; it happens every time Mark asks him for something.

“I don’t...I mean I _have_ to go to this party, it’s an official event,” Eduardo tries. It’s diplomacy, today. That’s the most common Wardo Defense Strategy, but sometimes he appeals to Mark’s better nature or something and that almost always ends in him folding like a hot dog bun.

Mark is unphased. He just shrugs. “I could tag along, we can just hang out there.”

“Well, I get a plus one, but I don’t—”

“That’s perfect!” Mark interrupts. “They _want_ you to bring people, so bring me. It’ll be a lot less embarrassing if you can prove you’re actually capable of making friends without going through a hazing ritual.”

“Well, we definitely hazed him,” Dustin cuts in, because he can’t resist. Both of the other boys jump, looking at him in shock. Or, okay, Eduardo looks startled, Mark looks as stoic as ever. Death, taxes, Mark is a robot. Dustin’s fond of it by now. 

“Have you been in here the entire time?” Eduardo asks, shifty like he’s got something to hide. 

“Had to plug in my laptop. Wardo, if anyone’s going to be your date it should be me, I’m way more fun at parties. Or have you forgotten that Mark brought a _Rubik’s Cube_ to the AEPi date party?”

“Well it’s not like I could have brought Erica,” Mark says stiffly. Eduardo looks like he has a headache.

“I’m not bringing _either_ of you to the Phoenix party, Mark, the plus one is really meant more for, for girlfriends and things.”

 _And things_ Dustin mouths back at him, and Eduardo flips him off. Dustin laughs and rolls over so he’s on his stomach, laptop safely set aside in favor of more important work. 

“Did anyone tell you you couldn’t bring a friend?” Mark asks. A challenge. Dustin would be making popcorn right now if they hadn’t broken the microwave last week making different snacks fight each other with toothpicks. 

“No but it’s, it’s a general understanding,” Eduardo says, pained. 

“A general understanding,” Mark repeats, in that way where he’s not asking a question but he wants the person he’s talking to to question themselves. Poor Eduardo. “That doesn’t sound particularly formal, and The Phoenix is all about formalities, so, if something isn’t formalized, it can’t be very important, can it?” Dustin can’t really poke any holes in that logic. He looks at Eduardo, eyebrows raised, totally on Mark’s side for this one.

“Mark,” Eduardo says like he’s choking. “Don’t you think they might? Assume I maybe brought _you_ as my date?”

Mark doesn’t seem to think that’s a problem, which makes sense. He just waves a hand dismissively and says, “Well that’s fine, that’s perfect, actually, because then it wouldn’t be weird if you brought me to other events there. I’d say that works out perfectly.” Mark is in full Thinking Mode now. Dustin can see the gears turning. He’s always admired Mark’s mind, been blown away by how quickly he comes up with these unbelievably creative concepts. This one, though, this one might be the one that goes too far. 

Actually, that was probably FaceMash. 

“Mark. I’m not...you can’t be my _date_ at this party. For so many reasons, Jesus, I shouldn’t even have to be explaining this.”

“Relax Wardo, no one’s going to assume that anyway, what about us would possibly lead some stranger to conclude that we’re secret gay lovers or something?” Eduardo cringes. Dustin kind of does too. “And even if they did, no one’s going to say anything. It doesn’t have to be a big deal. You can introduce me to your fancy new friends and I’ll offer them as little personal information as possible. We can let them think whatever they want about us, you’re already in so who cares if I get to benefit a little too. It’s a perfect plan.”

“It’s _not_ a perfect plan.” Eduardo insists. Dustin honestly doesn’t know why he’s still fighting this; he’s going to say yes to Mark. He always says yes to Mark. 

“I really don’t see what you aren’t getting here. Besides, you were the one trying to cancel on me when we’ve had plans for two weeks.”

Dustin perks up. They had _plans_? Mark had scheduled _plans?_

“What plans?” he asks, doing his best not to sound put out. 

The corner of Mark’s mouth turns up in a rare smile, and he glances at Eduardo before saying, “They’re showing _Goldeneye_ at the theater this weekend, and far be it from me to pretend like it’s a very _good_ movie, but Wardo wanted to go.” 

Eduardo elbows him, looking fond, and Dustin thinks maybe he actually shouldn’t have come into Mark’s room after all. 

“Mark thinks the hacking scenes are funny,” Eduardo says, laughing. “You’re not pinning this one on me.”

Mark rolls his eyes, but he’s still smiling, and it’s. Weird. It’s really weird. 

“Do you have to go to this party?” Mark asks quietly, like Dustin isn’t even there anymore. 

Eduardo sighs. “Alright. You can come.” He sits next to Dustin on Mark’s bed, and oh god, oh god, Dustin needs to get out of here right now.

“Bye guys! Have fun at your super secret spy party!” he calls, practically tripping in his haste to grab his laptop and be somewhere Mark and Eduardo are not. 

Chris is in their room, working diligently on an essay. He doesn’t even glance up at Dustin when he comes in, which Dustin is grateful for because he kind of needs a minute. He’s not even aware that he’s frowning from thinking too hard until Chris asks, “What’s up?”

“Do you think...are Mark and Eduardo a thing?” he blurts out. 

Now Chris is frowning. 

“A thing?”

“Are they together?” he tries instead. 

Chris opens his mouth, closes it. Opens it again. 

Before he can answer, though, the front door opens, and Dustin feels his eyes widen. 

“Billy!” he yells, running into the common area to stop their other roommate from innocently wandering into his bedroom without knowing Eduardo is there. Billy freezes halfway to the door. “Don’t go in there,” Dustin says quietly, careful not to be heard by the room’s current occupants. 

“Dustin, I don’t have time for—”

“Chris and I are holding conference in our room. You should probably hear this one.”

He still looks annoyed, but Billy follows Dustin back into Chris and Dustin’s room, glancing once more at the door to his own room.

“Okay, what’s this all about?” he asks once they’re safely tucked inside. 

“I think Mark and Eduardo might be, y’know. A thing. On the downlow.” Billy laughs, but Chris is silent, and they both turn to look at him.

“I mean, you might have a point,” Chris says. “I saw Mark _apologize_ to him the other day. Has Mark ever apologized to any of you?”

Dustin lowers his voice conspiratorially, pleased to have at least gained some insider info from his time in the other room. “I was just in there when they got home and—don’t look at me like that, Billy, you know your room has the prime outlet real estate—anyway, I was in there and they were talking about going to the movies _alone together_ , and then Mark got Wardo to bring him to his Phoenix party.”

Chris and Billy exchange a look. 

“Right?!” Dustin exclaims. 

“If Mark Zuckerberg got a boyfriend before me, I’m dropping out of Harvard,” Billy says. Chris makes a noise in agreement. 

The sound of the door to Mark and Billy’s room opening makes them all freeze. Cautiously, Dustin pokes his head into the common area and sees Eduardo putting on his coat, Mark leaning against the wall, waiting to see him out. It kind of tugs at Dustin’s heart a little, actually. Mark looks soft and comfortable in a way Dustin rarely sees him. And if that’s Eduardo’s doing, then this whole thing is probably good. He just hopes it doesn’t end as explosively as the Erica situation did, because it would really suck if Eduardo stopped coming around all the time. 

“Bye Wardo!” he calls. Eduardo looks up and smiles at him, then looks confused. Dustin turns around, and Billy and Chris have apparently also decided to poke around the doorframe. _Amateurs._ Dustin swats at them. 

“ _Be cool_ ,” he hisses. 

“Uh, bye guys,” Eduardo says with an awkward wave. Then he turns back to Mark. “Bye. I guess I’ll see you tomorrow night? I can swing by here before the party, or you can come to my dorm if you’d rather?”

“I’ll just go there, we could eat before we go,” Mark says. Billy sucks in a breath loudly, way, way too loudly oh my god he and Chris are _so bad at this._

“Sure. Sounds like a plan.” Eduardo smiles at him, and Mark smiles back, and that, more than all of the incredibly damning conversations Dustin has heard this afternoon, is what confirms this whole thing for him. He ducks back into his room, where Billy and Chris are sitting opposite each other and making crazy faces. 

“Oh my god,” Dustin whispers to them. 

“What the fuck!” Billy agrees. 

“I can’t believe they didn’t tell us.”

“Well, I don’t know, I get it,” Chris says. “I mean, obviously they can trust us, they have to know that, but. I mean. It’s Mark.”

The front door closes, meaning Eduardo has gone home. Dustin wanders back into the common area and finds Mark, still leaning against the wall and looking thoughtful. 

“Fun plans tomorrow?” he asks, doing his best to wiggle his eyebrows and probably failing. Mark doesn’t even acknowledge him, which means he’s thinking about something. Maybe coding. Maybe Eduardo. “Good talk.” Dustin glances at their new copier paper art piece again. It’s at such an awkward place on the wall, way too low to look like an intentional poster. 

As expected, though, Mark is entirely oblivious to the things in front of him. 

**4\. Heather**

The worst part about Phoenix parties, in Heather’s extremely expert opinion, is the part when the actual party ends and Tucker rounds up the boys for whatever Secret Society nonsense it is this week. That’s right around when all the one-night only girls filter out back to the Fuck Truck and Heather gets left alone with the half-empty drinks and Deb fucking Villenueve. 

Heather thinks she might hate Deb Villenueve a little less if she didn’t think they were such excellent friends. Deb’s a fine enough person to make small talk with for twenty minutes, but Heather has been exiled with her at every Phoenix function for the last eighteen months and her considerable patience has worn as thin as the fancy Persian carpet that lines the stairs of the clubhouse. Heather used to find it frustratingly hard to walk up them in heels, but now it’s second nature, quick and quiet even. It’s almost like a game of hide and seek, avoiding Deb in the long stretches of time they have while the club puts the secret in secret society. 

Ugh. Heather’s really exhausted by all of this to be honest. 

So maybe that’s why, when she gets to the top of the stairs and sees not Deb, but a curly-haired guy in an oversized sweatshirt typing away rapidly at a laptop, she’s not just relieved, but almost excited. 

“Oh, hi,” she says. “I didn’t realize anyone else was up here.” 

“I can be here, right,” the guy says, not looking up at her, but it’s more a statement than a question. Heather wonders if he’s done some adderall. 

“They’re starting the actual meeting now, so—” 

“I’m not a member.” 

“You’re not a member?” Heather asks, flopping into the chair across the landing from him. 

“Correct,” he says, hands still flying over the keys. “I’m here with Eduardo,” his hands pause. “Do you know Eduardo? Saverin? Nice hair? Really nice jacket? Alright face.” 

Heather racks her mind; she’s pretty sure she’d remember if Nathan had mentioned an incoming member named Eduardo. But something about the jacket comment does bring the vague outline of someone to mind. 

“I think I might,” Heather says diplomatically. 

The guy nods. “I’m his plus-one.” 

Members get plus-ones to events with the implication that they’re meant for dates and girlfriends, but Heather supposes it’s not technically against any rules to bring a friend or a roommate. Most guys don’t even bring a plus-one, preferring to sift through that night’s crowd of future senatorial affair candidates. So bringing a date at all is unusual, bringing your friend is almost unheard of. 

Heather leans down and unclasps her strappy heels, “Well, welcome to the second half of the party. If you see another girl, that’s Deb and she sucks. Don’t get stuck talking to her or you’ll be hearing about how she’s _technically_ a Vanderbilt-in-law for an hour. Like, your sister married in, not you _Debra_.” 

“I’m sorry, who are you exactly?” The guy asks. 

“I’m Heather, Heather Robins. I’m Nathan’s girlfriend. Did you meet him, he’s the social chair?” 

“Jewish Nathan?” 

“Yeah,” Heather says, and then feels weird about it, and then wonders if feeling weird about it is WASPy of her. She’ll ask Nathan later. 

“So you probably know a lot about all the members and stuff.” 

Heather snorts. “Oh yeah I know the dirt on _everyone_. Nathan and I have been dating for three years, so I’ve come to like. Everything.” 

He considers this for a moment and then closes his laptop, setting it beside him on the upholstered bench, “It’s very excellent to meet you Heather, I’m Mark.” 

She shakes the hand he offers. “Sorry to say I’m probably the only interesting person you’re going to meet the rest of this evening.” 

“Right, because my only other option is Deb the wannabe Vanderbilt right?” Mark says. He has kind of a weird voice Heather thinks, like he’s a computer system on Star Trek or something, but his lips twitch into the ghost of a smile and Heather thinks maybe it’s not bad weird. 

“Here, hold that thought,” Heather says. “Let me get us some drinks.” 

Mark loosens up a little, but not as much as Heather might expect a sophomore to, when she gets some double malt top shelf whiskey into him. He winces every time he takes a sip but he doesn’t complain. 

“So when you break it down,” Heather says, taking a sip from her own glass, “there’s basically three types of people who get into the Phoenix. First you have your legacies, obviously, they tend to take it pretty seriously except for when they don’t. Once you get down past second generation, third generation, it starts to get a little dicey. Matthew Daniels is a fifth generation legacy and it really fucking shows.” 

“Matthew Daniels sounds like a law firm,” Mark muses. 

Heather laughs, “I _wish_ he was a law firm, he’s a pain in the ass but he got in because-” 

“Because he basically couldn’t not,” Mark says. 

“Right. Then you have your Rising Stars, which might be legacies of other clubs that we poached, or just people who have started making a name for themselves on campus. Sometimes in athletics but also other stuff. Richard Yeo is, apparently, big man in the music department.” 

“So that’s Eduardo?” 

Heather takes a sip, considering. “Eduardo might be more of a Wild Card.”

“Is that why he got punched as a Junior and not a Sophomore?” 

“Oh,” Heather says, “That’s right I’d forgotten there was a Junior punch this year. That’s actually pretty rare, the only other junior punches I know are the Winklevoss twins. And that was probably just ‘cause they wanted to know if it was worth it to take both of them in that band of daddies boys.”

“Which club would that be?” Mark’s mouth twitches like the smile equivalent of a sneeze. 

“The Porcellian.” 

“Exclusive.” 

“ _Annoying_ ,” Heather corrects. “I can’t stand their girlfriends, they all think they’re _so_ much better than the rest of us. Like hi, wake up, you’re not even allowed in their special secret clubhouse. Anyways, what was I saying?” 

“Eduardo’s a Wild Card.” 

“Right, so like I said, the Phoenix cares a lot about that. Bringing in members that the other clubs would overlook because they’re not,” she waves a hand, “the stereotypical Harvard student I guess?” 

“Plus having international members like Eduardo opens a lot of doors for everyone else and vice versa,” Heather shrugs. “Topher would probably have my head if he knew I was telling you this, but it’s not like it’s really a secret. Just keep it close to the chest, okay?” 

“Who’s Topher?” 

“Christopher Yancey,” Heather clarifies. “The VP. Which like, he really needs to get off his high horse like we don’t all know what happened at the Christmas party with the delivery girl and the exfoliating body wash.” 

“He what?” Mark blinks and it’s the first time Heather’s seen him anything but prim and composed all evening. 

“Oh Mark sweetie, you’ve got _so_ much to learn,” she says, patting him on the knee and pouring herself another drink.

Normally, Heather finds that by the time the boys are done she’s about to claw her own eyes out in frustration — sometimes Deb-induced, other times not — so she’s surprised when she hears the heavy doors downstairs open and people start to trickle out.

“Oh my god, are they done already?” Heather asks, but when she checks her watch it’s been almost two hours. Time really does fly when you’re filling someone in on gossip. “I should go find Nathan, but this was really fun.”

Mark nods, holding out his hand for her to shake. “I very much enjoyed our conversation.” 

“Me too,” Heather says. “I hope I didn’t bore you too much.” 

“Absolutely not,” Mark says, and licks his lips. He could really use some chapstick but Heather thinks overall he’s not bad looking, even if he’s wearing Nike slides to a Phoenix party. Honestly she can admire the gumption, and she figures a lot of the members wear their stupid club hats, so clearly athletics wear is not entirely off the table. 

At the bottom of the stairs Nathan waves her over to where he’s chatting with a sophomore that Heather doesn’t know, but has a good guess as to who he might be if the hair is anything to go off of. 

“Eduardo,” Nathan says, confirming her suspicions, “Have you met my better half yet?” 

“Haven’t had the pleasure,” Eduardo says, and then makes a little face at himself, “Sorry, that sounded a little sleazy.” 

“Oh not at all,” Heather says, shaking the hand he offers as Nathan wraps a comfortable arm around her waist. “I’ve been here for years, I’ve heard much, much worse.” 

“Heather’s in PoliSci,” Nathan says, “Pre-law.” 

“Wow,” Eduardo grins, “Power couple.” 

“Oh yeah she’s definitely the brains behind the operation,” Nathan says, squeezing her side a little. 

“Speaking of,” Eduardo says, darting a look around, “I should probably go find Mark. If he’s even— actually he probably left already honestly...” He drifts off, pulling out his phone from his back pocket. 

“No, he’s still here,” Heather offers. 

“Oh you— did you talk?” Eduardo asks, voice going a little reedy as he shifts against the wood panelling. 

“Why? Oh god did he have like an essay to finish or something?” 

“No— I, no. Mark’s just not always uh, the best in new social situations?” Eduardo says with a series of grasping hand gestures. 

“Well we had a great time,” Heather says, laying it on a little thick because she will be _damned_ if she gets stuck with Deb again. “He’s welcome anytime.” 

Nathan half-scoffs, half-laughs, “Excuse you, you’re supposed to be pulling strings behind the scenes not blatantly doing my job in front of the new recruits.” 

“Well he’s going to find out sometime,” Heather says, “Besides, as president of the Phoenix S.K. First Wives Club all guests fall under my jurisdiction.” 

Eduardo makes a face at that, small and pleased, and then schools it away, like he’s smoothing down a shirt. Which hmm. Interesting. 

“I’m going to go try and track him down, Nate I’ll uh, I’ll email you?” 

Nathan snaps his fingers at Eduardo into finger guns, “Yeah you got it. Stay cool.” 

Heather politely waits until Eduardo is moving away from them, accepting passing by back pats and handshakes like he’s a small town mayor before turning on Nathan. 

“Stay cool?” 

Nathan blushes under his glasses, “I was trying it, shut up.” 

She leans up and kisses him on his still hot cheek, and then hovers for a second, keeping her voice low. 

“Is Eduardo gay?” 

Nathan blinks at her as she leans back down, “What? No, I don’t think so.” 

“I just thought, it kind of seems like he brought his boyfriend,” Heather says. 

“I think that’s his roommate,” 

“No, Mark said they don’t live together.” 

“Well, still,” Nathan says, in that placating way that makes her want to slap his dumb clubmaster glasses right off his face sometimes. Not really, because she loves him, but it’s still annoying. So she counters. 

“Mark waited for him for like two hours. Who else was there? Me and Deb. Why would he wait for hours if it was just his friend? Why wouldn’t he just go home?” 

“Maybe he wanted to scope out the house? Or Eduardo was his ride,” Nathan shrugs, “It’s not that weird.” 

“I guess,” Heather says, “but it’s just kind of different. Bringing a guy as your plus-one.” 

“Maybe hoping we’ll punch him next.” 

“Oh don’t worry,” Heather says, “I’ve cut right through his delusions of grandeur.” 

“That’s my girl,” Nathan says, tugging on one of her curls, “I gotta run next week’s guest list by Topher— and before you ask I did get your bestie Tyler Winklevoss on the list, even though I maintain he _was_ totally flirting with you last time.” 

“Yeah and then he immediately stopped when he found out I wasn’t single,” she counters, “If Topher wants to use guys from the Porc to get better hotties, or whatever he’s trying to do, I just want them to be not terrible. So no Roland Whittaker this time please.” 

“Yes dear,” Nathan says placatingly, giving her hand a squeeze. “I’ll try and be quick okay. Wheels up in ten?” 

“Wheels up in five.” 

“Deal,” Nathan says, and she watches him drift over to where Tucker and Topher are still holding court. 

Heather goes to retrieve her coat from the coat room, gracefully dodging past Deb and her boyfriend making out in an alcove, and she’s on her way back to Nathan when she bumps into Eduardo, making a slightly distressed face and straining his neck to look over the huddle of dispersing members. 

“Hey,” Heather says, “All good?” 

Eduardo swallows, his throat bobbing, “Um, no? Do you know where Mark went? I can’t find him.” 

“Did you look upstairs?” 

“Oh,” Eduardo’s brows crease, “I thought upstairs was just all— uhm, the, uh, private rooms?” It takes him a while to string together and she realizes in his awkward pauses and grasps for phrasing that he’s a lot drunker than she’d originally thought.

Heather shrugs, “It’s a mix, here I’ll show you where I left him,” she says, and doesn’t wait for him to agree before turning towards the backstairs. 

“So Mark didn’t uh, he didn’t say anything strange to you did he?” Eduardo cautions.

Heather gives him a look over her shoulder, “No. Why? Does he normally say strange things to girls at parties?” 

“Sometimes,” Eduardo huffs out on a puff of laughter.

“No, we just had a lovely chat, honestly bring him back anytime.” 

“Maybe,” Edaurdo says, “I don’t know I thought maybe— some of the other guys thought it was weird?” 

Heather tries to listen in between his words, and maybe she’s just overcompensating for being the last person in the world to realize her best friend from high school is gay, but she still thinks there’s more going on here than just two friends. So she chooses her words carefully. 

“Eduardo, if anyone has a problem with you bringing your...friend, you can tell Nathan and he will deal with it. Or you can tell me and I’ll tell him. Mark seems great, you’re allowed to bring _whoever_ you want with a plus one.” 

“I guess,” Eduardo says, grinning in that kind of self-depreciating way polite rich boys do. “I’m just glad he wasn’t bothering you. Or hiding in a corner with his laptop the whole time.” 

“I heard that,” Mark says from the top of the landing where he’s barely moved from where Heather left him. 

“You didn’t have to stay,” Eduardo says, passing by Heather, voice going all kinds of melty. 

“I said I would.” 

“I know, I know, but — ” Eduardo starts. “Hey, let’s get out of here.” He slings an arm around Mark in that softened heavy way guys start to do when they’re a bit drunk. 

Mark pulls part of the way away, but Eduardo’s arm stays slung around his back. “Wardo, you met Heather right? Heather, Eduardo Saverin.” 

“Hello again,” Eduardo says. “Thanks for your help Heather.” 

“Oh anytime,” Heather says, because she has a soft spot for guys who are a little lost. 

Eduardo runs his fingers through his softly deflating hair. “Heather told me you guys had a nice chat.” 

“Mark’s a great conversationalist.” 

“That’s news to me,” Eduardo says, looking at Mark fondly and then schooling his face into a more neutral expression. 

“I know how to talk to people, Wardo,” Mark says. 

“No, I know, I just felt bad about abandoning you.” 

Mark heaves a shrug with one shoulder. “It was fine.” 

“Okay,” Eduardo says, and then turns to Heather. “We won’t keep you. Have a good night.” 

“Get home safe,” Heather says, moving over so they can pass by her on the stairs, Mark giving her one last chin tilt of acknowledgement. Eduardo reconfigures so he can throw an arm around Mark’s shoulder, and they lean their heads together, Mark saying something Heather can’t hear that makes Eduardo laugh. And c’mon, she’s not crazy about this. 

No one _ever_ brings a friend as a plus one. 

“Mark and Eduardo are _absolutely_ dating,” she says as soon as she and Nathan are heading out the side door towards the car, Nathan halting from where he had been digging his keys out. 

“Sweetie— ” 

“Don’t sweetie me. Who spent like two hours with Mark, you or me? Point A, Eduardo brought him to an event that people usually bring their girlfriends to.” 

“Okay but there’s nothing that says he couldn’t just-” 

“Point _B_ ,” Heather continues, crossing around to the passenger side of the car, “Mark waited for him for like two hours. Who else was there? Me and Deb. Why would he wait for hours if it was just his friend? Why wouldn’t he just go home?” 

Nathan considers this for a long moment. “I guess. That does make sense.” 

“Thank you!” 

“So what,” Nathan says, “I mean we all knew Chase was gay and it wasn’t really a big deal.” 

Heather rolls her eyes. “Yeah and would he have been able to bring someone to an event? It was all okay for you guys to _know_ but no one said anything about it and it was just this big open secret until he graduated.” 

“Well, maybe Eduardo doesn’t want people to know,” Nathan reasons, pulling his door open and climbing into the car. 

“Maybe he would be okay with people knowing if he felt like he wasn’t going to get thrown out of the club. Or worse,” Heather says, pulling her door shut. “You’re always on my case for being WASPy but what are you doing to help the underdog?” 

Nathan sighs,“Okay, what do you propose I do about it?” 

“You’re the social chair, you have weight. The club should make a statement, say that you support having gay members and that sexuality isn’t a factor in people being selected.” 

Nathan turns to give her an incredulous look, “That’s not happening.” 

“Why not?” 

“You know why,” he says, hands flexing against the steering wheel as he puts his keys into the ignition. 

“No one’s going to think you’re gay, Nathan,” Heather retorts. 

“That’s not what I meant,” he says, angling out of the parking spot. Heather sets her jaw, if he wants to play hard ball. 

“So what you’re all proud of being the most diverse final club and upholding members that other clubs look over, but heaven forbid people know that some of you _might_ be gay. I can’t wait to tell Elijah about how you’re so willing to throw gay people under the bus, I’m sure he’ll definitely let us stay in his condo when I tell him all about how you—” 

“Look,” he says, “I can watch out for Eduardo and make sure no one says shit if he wants to bring his friend or his roommate or his whatever Mark is-” 

“—Boyfriend. He’s his boyfriend Nathan—”

“—But the club is not going to go for a big public statement for what, for some brownie points?” 

“Fine, whatever,” Heather says, crossing her arms over her chest. 

“Heather,” Nathan says, “Can we not do the whole silent treatment thing?” 

Heather stares out the window, Nathan making a series of increasingly displeased noises before finally turning the radio on for the rest of the short drive back to their apartment. 

“Are you just going to ignore me all night?” Nathan says, when she still hasn’t said anything, climbing out of the car as soon as he’s parked in their spot and making a beeline for the elevators. “Heather! C’mon,” he calls after her, voice echoing across the parking garage. 

Heather jams the up button over and over again and doesn’t hold the door for Nathan, still a good ten feet away when the doors swish closed. It’s not much of a head start but it’s enough that she can have her shoes off and her laptop open by the time Nathan gets into the apartment. 

“Seriously?” He asks, gesturing at the door she locked behind her. 

“What’s the name of that Crimson reporter you have contact with?” Heather asks nonchalantly, feet tucked up under her on the couch. “Marilyn? Marian? Beleski right?” 

Nathan tilts his head at her, “Why?” 

“I know to your big boys clubhouse I’m just the future Ex-Mrs.-Nathan-Ehrlich, but I’m sure the good journalists at the Crimson would find what I have to say about the Phoenix after three years of intimate acquaintance very interesting. You know they’re always looking for some dirt on the clubs for their next op-ed.” 

“ _Heather_ -” 

“-Don’t Heather, me, I’m just taking a page out of your playbook,” she looks up at him challengingly, “You’d think that anonymous source about antisemitic punch practices would be a little more supportive of what I’m trying to do. Or are you one of those people who only cares about injustice when it affects you personally?” 

Nathan shakes his head and stalks off to the kitchen, Heather hears the fridge door open and shut while she pulls up her school email. He returns after a minute, suit jacket abandoned and a beer in hand before he flops down beside her a little bonelessly. 

“Sweetheart,” he says very earnestly, reaching for her, “I don’t ever want you to feel like that. Like you’re just the future Mrs. whatever.” 

She scoffs, but he’s insistent, cupping her face gently until she turns, “You shouldn’t want _anyone_ to feel like that. Look, I know you’re not that big on actual news when you can be reading Popular Mechanics but the Supreme freaking Court _just_ rejected the compromise about allowing same-sex civil unions instead of marriages.” 

Nathan blinks, “I don’t. What?” 

“There is a decently good chance we’re going to see gay marriage legalized in Massachusetts in the next year.” 

“Romney’s not going to go for that.” 

“Romney’s not going to have a choice,” Heather says, and god, she really needs to sit this boy down in a civics class at some point. “This is happening. This is already happening Nate, and your club can be the club ahead of the curve, or you can lag behind until you’re forced to make a statement.” 

Nathan exhales hard, taking off his glasses to rub at his eyes. “I really shot myself in the foot falling in love with a future lawyer, huh?” 

“And former state champion debater, yeah,” Heather says. 

“You think they’ll go for that, you think _Topher_ is going to go for that?”

“Not without the right incentives they won’t. You’re the PR guy, you know you just need to spin a story the right way,” Nathan sighs again and she switches tactics, “Look if Mark doesn’t come back to another party I literally think I won’t make it through the year without murdering Deb. Is that the blood you want on your hands?” 

“Alright,” Nathan says, kissing into her hair, “I’ll try, okay? But I can’t make any promises, you know the guys. They can be. Stubborn. But I will try.” 

Heather leans over her still open laptop to kiss him. “Thank you. I know Eduardo and Mark will really appreciate it.” 

**3 ½. Tyler**

The facts are these: Tyler Winklevoss is not gay. But he’s the identical twin of someone who is. So maybe that means he doesn’t “get it,” but he knows the score a hell of a lot better than your average John Doe, Tom Smith, or Clarence “Chip” Newmont IV. He’s also been, if he will say so himself, a downright saint about finding reasons to leave the dorm to Cam when Divya’s over. So when Tyler walks in on what’s clearly an in-process domestic, the abrupt silence may be warranted, but Cam’s unceremonious “ _Why_ are you _home?_ ” is just overkill. 

“We thought you were at Jake’s,” Divya clarifies. 

There’s been a lot of this “we” business lately. From a brotherly standpoint, that bodes well. Div’s a good guy. And he and Tyler were already friends beforeDivya and Cameron realized they were a match made in high-achieving heaven. So while Tyler’d had some qualms about being relegated to third wheel, nothing really ended up changing that much. 

From a rivalry standpoint, it sometimes feels like the next tally on a decade-long scoresheet of Tyler starting something with Cam following behind, then immediately being overtaken. Being Cameron’s twin meant you were always playing catch-up. Like how Tyler’s growth spurt started first, then Cam shot up to 6’5” pretty much overnight while Tyler was still accumulating those last two inches. Tyler was interested in rowing first, so Cam was the one who taped up a sheet of the year’s best race times and begged Daddy to put an ergometer in the attic. Tyler wanted to get into a final club? Cam wanted to punch the Porcellian. So it falls into a typical pattern that once Tyler’s started getting the hang of balancing his love life around classes, crew, and Porc meetings, he’d wake up one morning to the sound of Div quietly leaving the twins’ junior year dorm before crew, Cam folding during the walk to the boathouse about the fact that they’d been hooking up. 

“Jake wanted to leave earlier than me, so I said go ahead,” Tyler says. It sounds douchey, which is the point. Cam and Div share a little look across the Trouble In Paradise gap. Score one, Tyler. 

Score a _few_ , in the spirit of giving credit where credit is due. It’s been a good evening up until now. The Delphic wheel he’d been greasing _finally_ got him onto tonight’s invite list (that’s four different final clubs’ parties he’s talked his way into this year, yes, as a Porc); he passed Divya’s business card along to the guys bemoaning the awkwardness of rejecting open positions at family-owned accounting firms (after making the appropriate sympathetic remarks, of course, he’s not an animal); and he was shown a lovely time by a charming brunette who pulled him into the coatroom to appreciate her thigh tattoo (no jury would fault him for taking his time, it was a nice tattoo). 

“Two minutes, then I’m out of your hair,” Tyler promises, crossing to the bathroom to brush his teeth because he and Cam _should’ve_ turned in 45 minutes ago. That was the giveaway that Divya and Cam were having a love crisis. Cam’s way more of a stickler for getting enough rest before crew than Tyler is. No study date or business chat would get to run this long. 

As soon as he’s out of the room, Cam keeps talking in the low voice he uses when he doesn’t want Tyler to eavesdrop. With all due respect, it’s a wasted effort. It’s obvious they’re talking about the Crimson editorial about final clubs. He and Cam don’t read the newspaper, that’s what public broadcast and Divya are for, and Divya’s not one to hang on to old issues once he’s through reading them. So the fact that there’s a copy on their coffee table means it’s significant. The fact that Tyler’s already read the editorial independently of Divya shoving it under his nose? Also significant. 

“I’m just saying,” Divya says, at a normal volume (because Divya’s what men of honor and tradition like to call a real homie), “that the jump from ‘some of the guys in the Phoenix are gay,’ to ‘guys in final clubs are gay,’ to ‘the Porcellian is a final club,’ to ‘every member of the Porcellian, but especially Cameron Winklevoss, is gay,’ is a fucking stretch.”

Ah. So it’s this. 

Cameron and Divya don’t fight very much. Hardly ever, actually, which Tyler chalks up to the perks of getting to be a dude _and_ date a dude. Like minds, low drama. But when there is drama, it’s big. Like, Cam saying no when Mom asked if Div was ‘a special friend,’ level-big, or like the time Div got all possessive when Porc second cuts were a contest to show up with the hottest female date. As a bro, Tyler gets why Divya’s tired of Cam acting all lovey in private and clamming up whenever they’re anywhere people might see them (and the time Cam introduced Divya as “Tyler’s best friend” was _way_ out of line. Though true). But as Cameron’s twin, Tyler knows how important it is to Cam that people don’t look at him funny, or with pity, or like he’s anything less than the All-American scholar-athlete-socialite he spends every second working to be. 

Cam says something else, and Divya gets more frustrated and, also, louder. “ _Tyler_ didn’t even have a clue until we told him, and Tyler’s your twin brother.” Tyler gives him half points for that. No, Tyler did not know Cam and Divya had become Cam-and-Divya until probably a couple weeks after the fact, but Tyler knew Cam, and Cam’s awkward crush on Divya had been _painfully_ obvious the entire time Cam and Div were roommates. It was almost more surprising to Tyler that they got together _not_ during sophomore year when they lived together than it was to find out Divya and Cam were together in the first place. 

“Tyler didn’t have a clue what?” He calls through a mouthful of toothpaste, both to act like he hasn’t been listening in and to let them know they’re being loud enough that he could. It’s just etiquette. He spits and rinses a little quicker than 9 out of 10 dentists would recommend, but hey. Meddling with your twin brother’s love life is a health priority.

Cam is less than thrilled when Tyler walks back into the main room. _I would prefer it if you not do this_ is written so clearly across his face it’s like he wired it directly into Tyler’s brain. Tyler raises his eyebrows back — _so say something if it bugs you that much_ — and takes Cam’s silence as the permission it isn’t, dropping into one of the pleather chairs.

“Settle this for me, man,” Divya says, not answering Tyler’s question but still inviting him into the conversation, which was the whole point anyway. “It’s weirder for me and Cam to suddenly act like we don’t know each other than it would be to carry on as usual, right? People are used to seeing us together. Am I missing something?”

Cameron mutters, “leading question,” at the same time Tyler turns to him to say “Weren’t you guys just fighting about this? Like, this summer?” 

“There was another editorial,” Divya explains. Divya’s usually the one complaining about being the one left out of conversations, so he’s good about that. “Just, you know, the same ‘Are final clubs too exclusionary’ op-ed they put out every semester— ”

“Yeah, yeah, they were talking about that at the Delphic party,” Tyler says, and Cam goes very still, so Tyler drives onward. “Just, you know, Jake said he was surprised to see Nathan Ehrlich talking about gay rights stuff, ‘I thought he had a girlfriend,’ etcetera, Keith Spiner says ‘No he does, he’s just the social chair, he does the press stuff,’ mystery solved, then a free-for-all about how the clubs going co-ed would piss off the alumni boards _but_ it would also mean more girls. That was it. Cam, relax, no one’s hunting you down.”

Tyler can tell he swung a little too far at the end there. Shit. He knows it’s more a testament to the crew he tends to roll with at parties that no one had anything nasty to say than it is a sign Cam has nothing to worry about, he _knows_ that, so he glances over at Divya with a fix-it-please grimace and Divya crosses over to settle next to Cam. 

“I don’t think you’re wrong about being careful, okay? I get it. We’ve _been_ careful. All I’m saying is maybe we can keep up with what’s been working for two years instead of getting overcautious now. And if someone’s going to make an assumption, they’ve probably got more of an open mind than someone who wouldn’t make that leap, in my experience.”

Cameron _and_ Tyler’s backs straighten like Divya’s yanked their marionette strings.

Tyler says, “Wait, years?”

Cameron says, “That has not, remotely, been my experience.”

Tyler says, “ _Two years?_ ”

Divya says, “I guess I wouldn’t know what’s been your experience, would I? I guess that would involve you _filling me in_ on the _details_ of your _life_.”

Tyler says, “Two? Years?”

Divya throws an agitated gesture toward Tyler. “ _Why_ do you keep _saying_ that?!” 

“You two got together last winter. I was _there_ when you two got together last winter.”

Divya swivels his gaze back toward Cam, voice low and somewhat murderous. “You said. You _talked. To him_.” 

“Yes, I told him we were together,” Cam says. He’s using his Now Let’s All Be Reasonable voice. It does not have the desired effect. 

“I thought you meant it was _new_ ,” Tyler says, petulant. He sounds like a little kid, but then, he kind of feels like one. Odd one out, left out of the joke. He’s not the one that happens to. Having a twin brother was supposed to be insurance against it. 

Divya has one hand over his face. “I don’t understand why you do this. I don’t understand what we have to hide from _Tyler_.”

“Yeah, what’d you think _I_ was gonna do?” Tyler exclaims, buoyed by the fact that at least Divya’s with him on this one.

“You’re presenting this wrong, no one was _hiding_ anything. We _both_ agreed,” Cam says, bringing Divya down with him with a glance, “that it would be tactful to wait until after sophomore year.” 

“Yes, because that part of it made _sense_ ,” Divya says.

“Oh, it did?!” Tyler interjects. 

Divya and Cameron both start talking at the same time, “Because of Grant— ” “Because your roommate— ”

“Was an asshole, what does that have to do with you two?” 

Cameron cuts in first. “We were trying not to rub it in your face.”

“Didn’t have a problem rubbing something in someone’s face,” Tyler mutters.

“ _That_ is not helping,” Divya snaps, holding a finger up in Tyler’s direction without looking away from Cameron. 

And Cameron, well, Cameron’s looking at Tyler the way he does when they’re in trouble with Dad, which is dirty pool because it stirs up Tyler’s camaraderie instincts even though Cameron’s the one who’s the screw-up tonight. Tyler likes to be included. It’s comforting to know Cam well enough to read him like this, to communicate like this. It’s not the same thing as talking to him. It is not an apology.

And yet.

“Div, it’s late,” Tyler says, a calculated level of sheepish, fully aware that because he’s the one bringing it up, Divya will take it seriously. “Think we could table this until tomorrow?”

Divya _does_ check his watch before agreeing, because he’s always kind of an asshole. But he also drifts back over to Tyler’s doorway to say goodnight before Tyler’s all the way asleep, interrupting whatever hushed conversation he and Cam were winding down, and Tyler tries to reassure himself he isn’t an interloper in his own home. 

The thing about Cam not telling him things is that until now, they’ve never felt like _secrets_. They’ve been more like challenges, and Tyler loves a challenge. Like how back in high school, Cam didn’t act caught when Tyler put together that he didn’t like girls. He was relieved. He _wanted_ Tyler to be the one to put it together. 

Or like the summer when Tyler got really into ciphers. He’d been having an alright time by himself with just a pen and a notebook, but Cam wanted in on it, and Cam was the one who made a game out of it. First decoding inside jokes, then decoding dares, and they kept themselves entertained the entire five-hour drive to Nantucket that way, no mean feat for the attention span of two sixteen-year-old boys.

They’d been in better spirits than usual that trip, because Tyler had recently put together why Cam got so withdrawn and awkward when Ty wanted to talk about girls, and Cam, for once, was not being a giant buzzkill about missing rowing practice, because Cam fucking loved staying at hotels. It was embarrassingly obvious how much more he preferred visiting their cousins when they were a locked door and elevator ride away instead of a comfortable three-feet-from-the-air-mattress-and-a-whispered-“Hey, are you guys still awake?” distance over. It was the kind of thing he’d sometimes make fun of about Cam, but never with any bite. It didn’t actually bother him. The areas in which he and Cam were different used to scare him, but being able to figure out the logic behind them helped. He could still read Cam better than anyone. They still had a connection. 

And Tyler liked that Cam having secrets meant knowing things no one else did. Like when their cousin Annette brought her boyfriend to dinner, and Cam knocked Tyler’s glass of water over when he asked the twins what colleges they were applying to. Tyler entertained himself by kicking Cam under the table whenever Carter said something, Cam got flustered and then genuinely annoyed in a way he never did when Tyler had tried to talk to him about girls, and Tyler made it up to him, leaving his dessert untouched long enough for Cam to take it as permission to swap their plates once he’d finished his (stone fruit pavlova poached in off-vintage Bordeaux, a true American sacrifice). 

But Tyler, apparently, was not the only one keeping an eye on Cam that particular trip. 

The twins’ Aunt Meredith was the kind of person Mom described as having “a chip on her shoulder, and not in a good way.” The family gossip was that she’d dropped out of Bryn Mawr to marry Uncle Jim, and brought it up any time someone had a problem with her (which was pretty often), even though a long engagement while she finished her degree had, apparently, always been on the table. 

Tyler loved the family gossip, but he also loved a challenge. 

It took a few years (and a lot of biting his tongue), but eventually, Tyler was definitely Aunt Meredith’s favorite. It paid off every single time Aunt Meredith snapped at their cousins but left him alone (Tyler was usually the one getting snapped at by adult supervision; it wasn’t his fault, he has the soul of an explorer).

So when Aunt Meredith yelled at him for kicking sand onto her towel on one of the occasions Cam had opted out of going to the beach (to go over college admissions guides, again), Tyler put together right away that she thought he was Cam. It was kind of unflattering that their own family members still relied so much on their clothes and the way they styled their hair to be able to tell them apart, but whatever. There were worse burdens to bear, probably. 

It would have revealed a little too much to correct her based solely on the fact that she was scolding him, but Tyler figured she’d call him by the wrong name sooner or later, so he settled back on his towel, not particularly bothered. Carter and Annette were body-surfing close to the shore, laughing and splashing one another, but Aunt Meredith and her picnic basket of snacks won out over any desire to join the fun — there were bagels with fresh cream cheese and lox, and an assortment of red fruits: strawberries, raspberries, apple slices, and crisp cherry tomatoes. And Tyler didn’t know Carter all that well yet, so it was interesting to watch him with Annette. Tyler didn’t think they’d been together all that long yet, but he acted like they’d been together a long time. He wasn’t afraid he’d make her angry by picking her up and tossing her into the waves with easy familiarity, and in return she climbed on his shoulders and dunked his head under, laughing the whole time. Tyler was still trying to master the art of sticking the landing with girls. He felt like he could learn a thing or two from Carter. 

Aunt Meredith startled him out of his observations by snapping her fingers at him, like he was a waiter or something. Like he was a dog. 

“Put your tongue back in your mouth, jesus _christ_ ,” she said in the nastiest voice Tyler had ever heard from her. He gaped back at her, thoroughly perplexed. He hadn’t even gone for the snacks yet; what was she talking about? 

“Don’t play dumb. I’m sure you think you’re subtle, but I’m not as dense as your mommy and daddy say I am, Cameron Winklevoss.”

There it was. “I’m Tyler,” he offered hopefully. 

Apparently that was _not_ the right thing to say. She set her book down and turned to him with the full scope of her disgust. “I am just about at the end of my rope with you,” she said. “I am _not stupid_. Now, I know that you’re a smart kid, and I’m sure it’s nice to think you can get away with whatever you want indefinitely, but you are in for a _rude_ awakening once everyone stops turning a blind eye.”

“A blind eye to what?” He asked, because all this seemed a bit much for something as small as trying to pull a switcheroo, even for Aunt Meredith. And besides, they hadn’t even done that since they were little. 

She leaned in close enough that he could smell the wine on her breath. “Like you don’t know.”

There was no way she could know about— _Tyler_ hadn’t even known about—

“Don’t make me spell it out for you; there are some things this family shouldn’t be overheard discussing in public.”

What the fuck. What the _fuck_.

She put a hand on his shoulder, the way Mom would when she wished him luck before crew events. Tyler half-expected her to dig into his skin with her fingernails, but the palm of her hand didn’t even make contact, just the clammy tips of her fingers. The way you’d hold a soiled dishrag, barely touching it. “And keep your eyes to yourself around Carter, for _god’s_ sake. Your poor brother was going through a trial and a half at dinner, trying to make conversation around all your staring. And all the while you’re stealing the food off his plate? What kind of an impression do you think you’re _making?_ ” 

Rage had blistered through him with such white-hot intensity it frightened him, the cruelest words he could imagine building up on the tip of his tongue. And he couldn’t _say_ them, not if she’d just blame Cameron for them.

Tyler wondered if that was what it meant to be grown-up, to be so angry and not able to do anything about it. 

People had been calling Cameron grown-up since they were thirteen. 

“ _I’m not Cameron,_ ” he insisted one last time before he threw on his jacket, picked up his things, and took off, not caring if he kicked sand into the picnic basket in his escape. 

Tyler had barely taken note of the punishing summer heat as he’d bolted past lawyers and stockbrokers and off-season baseball managers. Past Bill the desk attendant who refreshed plates of warm cookies every couple hours, or Maria the concierge who was getting married in the fall. Normally he’d have stopped for a chat, but not this time, his social graces knocked so very askance he barely remembered to wave half-heartedly in his haste to get to the elevator, to get to his brother. 

Cam had looked up with irritation when Tyler burst into their room, but he caught Tyler’s expression quickly, allowing the sheaf of papers in his hand to fall gently to the desk. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

“I’m gonna _kill_ Aunt Meredith,” he grated out, which had the unfortunate effect of diminishing Cam’s alarm.

“What’s she doing now?” he asked mildly.

“She thought I was you.” 

He’d dreaded the thought of having to repeat anything she’d said, but this was Cam he was talking to, so he didn’t have to. It must have been all over his face.

And Cam had given this noncommittal hum that made Tyler wonder if he’d lost his mind. “She doesn’t like me as much as you.”

“No, Cam, she _despises_ you, it was— it was fucking _hateful_ ,” he said urgently, furiously. But all that did was make Cam look at him like he was slow on the uptake. Like he was a stupid baby. 

“Yes, Tyler, she’s made that perfectly clear for several years now.” 

Tyler’s thoughts began chasing each other in a desperate cyclone. What did that _mean_ , did that mean she _knew_ for several years? And Cam had known she’d known and just let her treat him like a dog? While Tyler walked around oblivious to _everything?_

“Well I’ve been sucking up to her for years! Jesus, why wouldn’t you say anything?” 

“Why didn’t you _notice?!_ ” Cam fired back, getting to his feet so they were at eye level.

And Tyler hadn’t known what to say to that, because he’d fucking tried, hadn’t he? He’d thought he’d put it together before anyone else but apparently not. Apparently his _bitch_ aunt had been keeping a better eye on his own brother, his own fucking twin brother.

For _years_.

“We have to get her back for it,” Tyler had said, switching tracks to something he could actually focus on. “She can’t just go around thinking she can get away with it.”

“Okay, what the hell do you think I’ve been _doing?_ ” Cameron shot back, not grateful in the slightest for the support. He held up an admissions packet. “You think this is fun? You think I wouldn’t like fucking around on the beach for a while? Everything I’ve been doing this whole vacation has been an effort to prove I’m not the fuck-up she thinks I am. Everything I’ve been doing with _my life_ has been an effort to stay ahead of everyone who might think I’m lesser-than, who might think I’m some— some undisciplined hedonist— ” Tyler tried to interrupt, with no idea what he might actually say, but Cam didn’t let him. “I’m not like you, alright? I can’t afford to screw around. Because other people will _not_ afford me the slack they’ve afforded you. I’m not saying that’s your fault but I am _asking_ you to bear it in mind.”

Tyler had slunk off to his parents’ room after that, needing some space from Cam but not anywhere near prepared to be around extended family. He’d yanked the door closed with a satisfying slam, prompting a “What’s the matter, cupcake?” from his mother and a “No, I’m _sure_ that’s Tyler, dear,” from Daddy in the bathroom (like Cam never slammed doors, what the hell). 

“I’m Tyler,” he confirmed glumly, and allowed his mother to come up behind him and pull him into her arms, resting her head on his shoulder and swaying him back and forth. Sometimes it alarmed Tyler to have grown so much bigger than someone so important to him, and he missed being the age where she could lift him up and bounce him on her hip. Even if Daddy sometimes joked it was where all his behavioral issues stemmed from, that he’d been spoiled for too long. As though Cam clinging to their mother’s legs and hiding behind her in most of their baby photos was some sign of impending maturity. 

She gave him a comforting squeeze, like the spoonful of sugar before the medicine. “What’s the matter, pumpkin?” 

“Aunt Meredith, mostly. Cam a little bit,” he admitted, not wanting to say too much in case he gave anything away that Cam wasn’t ready to have out in the open. 

Daddy emerged from the bathroom, tie finally done up to his satisfaction in time to catch Mom’s gentle admonishment of “Try not to pick fights with your brother, darling, you know he’s _sensitive._ ” 

And then Daddy made the sort of face that Tyler realized wasn’t meant for him, it was just for Mom, and it had occurred to him for the first time in his life that he and Cam weren’t the only ones in their family who spoke to each other wordlessly, who spoke to one another in code.

And he wasn’t the only one in his family who could read Cam at a glance, and maybe he was the worst of them all.

Tyler has been to a lot of weddings in his 22 years, and the fact that “never go to bed angry” is always touted as the #1 piece of advice for newly wedded couples is starting to become a growing concern of his. It completely disregards the Tyler Winklevosses of the world, whose tempers require a good night’s sleep to flare up. 

He tosses his crew bag on the couch with zeal, and nearly jumps out of his skin when it huffs back at him. 

“What did I ever do to you?” Divya grumbles into a throw pillow, words coming out all mushy through his mouth guard. 

“I get that you and Cam wouldn’t have just cozied up last night after the theatrics, but you couldn’t go home? Where your bed is?”

Divya’s back cracks no less than five times when he sits up. Tyler would feel bad if this wasn’t such an obvious sleeping-on-the-couch cause and effect. Well, he would feel worse. He feels a little bad.

“I’m making a point?” Divya says, with the ‘hello, are you an idiot?’ left to implication. Tyler feels less than a little bad, and decides against courteously looking away while Divya tries and fails to look dignified at taking his mouth guard out. “I cleared out my evening to be here. If Cameron wants to be a tool, fine, but he can look at what he’s missing head-on. And it’s a 23-minute walk back to my apartment, and it’s cold. Are you making breakfast?” 

“I’m making breakfast for me,” Tyler says, a generous description of just heating up water for instant oatmeal, but still more than he’s willing to do for someone who called himself Tyler’s best friend while lying to him for a year. Not fucking cool.

Divya flops back down onto his back. “Okay, I know you’re mad. And I am going to be very generous and say I get why you’re mad at Cam. But I think it’s pretty rich for you to get pissy at me ’cause you felt left out.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Exactly what I said, man,” Divya says, irritatingly calm. “You had Cam to yourself for eighteen years. You’re in a goddamn _secret society_ together. And how many times have I sat in this room while you two have conversations with your fucking _eyes_ and I just have to sit here and hope one of you clues me in?”

Tyler tries to channel most of his aggression into stirring his oatmeal. “So, what, this was revenge or something?”

“No, it was fucking, sometimes things just shake out in a way that’s not fun for everyone. Cam wanted to keep things on the downlow sophomore year for reasons that both did and didn’t pertain to you. But then you two punched the Porc last year, so it all evened back out, didn’t it.”

Not getting punched sophomore year was something that had bonded the three of them, so Tyler _had_ worried a little that there would be some resentment on Divya’s end when they ended up making the cut as juniors. There had been some jokingly aggressive “That’s it, you’re dead to me”-type remarks, but Divya was an aggressive person on a good day, so Tyler had told himself not to push it.

He wonders if maybe Divya had wanted him to push it. 

“I wanted you to get punched too,” Tyler says, because it’s true and because, jesus, it should’ve been obvious. “Every time we go to some stupid luncheon or chapter meeting I wish you were there.”

“Yeah, I know,” Divya says, but his voice sounds soft, like maybe he’s re-realizing it. “And I wanted to tell you me and Cam were together. It wasn’t _fun_ keeping it from you. You’re my best friend, man.”

“Fuck, dude, you too.” There’s a heavy pause, and they can both hear Cam beginning to wake up and move around in his room, but it doesn’t feel like an interruption. “Want me to make you something?” Tyler offers, because this is the kind of high-emotion conversation he needs to eat his way through, and Divya’s not on such thin ice anymore that Tyler’s gonna make him get up for his own instant oatmeal or granola or whatever if he’s feeling similarly.

“It’s ass o’clock in the morning, I want to go back to sleep. Just, needed to make sure you won’t spend the whole morning at crew writing me out of your will first.” Divya nestles back into the pillow, pulling the throw blanket over his face as though the rising sun offends him.

“I knew you only loved me for my baseball cards and assorted sweatbands,” Tyler declares melodramatically through a mouthful of oatmeal, which is, of course, the moment Cam emerges from his room, eyeing Tyler inquisitively.

Tyler doesn’t fill him in. See how he likes it.

Cam nudges Divya’s foot with the back of his hand as he strolls past the couch. “Bed’s empty if you want it,” he says nonchalantly, because Cameron’s the kind of person who excels at making things okay just by pretending that they are.

Divya doesn’t move, and Tyler follows his lead rather than Cam’s. “Can’t believe you made _him_ sleep on the couch,” he says judgmentally. “You call that hosting? Who raised you?”

“Lovely couple from Greenwich, I’ll introduce you sometime,” Cam patters back, rummaging around for a banana or granola bar, something he can eat quickly on the walk over. Tyler’s happy to wrap up quickly and be on their way, assuming any residual tension will be left behind with Divya for at least the next few hours.

He couldn’t be more wrong.

Cam sets them off at a grueling pace, and Tyler is only too happy to start off strong so they can coast later, already feeling the extent to which he’s not on his A-game. He watches the angry set of Cam’s shoulders, the dig and pull of the oar against the current jerking them rhythmically forward and back like a bird’s wings, riding the movement on near-instinct. They fly through the water like they’re a part of it, like it’s coursing up through them.

They don’t ease up.

Tyler’s bones ache from throwing his weight against the impact of the oar hitting the water, not the normal, satisfying burn he gets from a challenging run of it but something much deeper. It isn’t long before he’s swallowing pain with every movement, just trying to keep the pace.

“Can we take it easy for a minute? If we keep going like this, I’m not going to be able to move tomorrow.”

“Sounds like your endurance could use the extra training,” Cam says, the muscles of his back snapping forward like he’s laying into a punching bag.

Every breath Tyler takes feels like it’s peeling away strips of his lungs, the breath whistling in his throat. Yes, he could disrupt their momentum, put a stop to it all if he really wanted to, but it would go against everything in him to be an anchor rather than an engine. And then he’d be the one putting distance between him and Cam, wouldn’t he, so he grits his teeth and he keeps up, every dig of the oar sounding like _fuck you fuck you fuck you_.

By the time they’ve finished, Tyler is breathing so heavily he’d believe that there was blood coming up with every exhale.

“Was it worth kicking your own ass just to kick mine?” He grates out.

Cam (it brings Tyler no small amount of satisfaction to note) is doubled over, head between his knees. “I feel great,” he wheezes. “We needed that.”

Cam has to run over to the woods to throw up (serves him right), so when Coach finally comes around to yell at them about how better crewmen have _died_ overexerting themselves, Tyler gets the brunt of it. He considers himself only approximately 25 percent at fault, but he keeps his mouth shut and takes it. Like the adult that he is and like he isn’t mostly concentrating on not blacking out. 

Still, it sucks to know they’re both gonna be punished for their stupidity at practice tomorrow when he’s only marginally responsible for said stupidity. And if Cam thinks Tyler’s going to hang around their dorm with him before he needs to head to Macro & Financial Policy without breaking something he is out of his _damn_ mind, so Tyler figures today’s as good a day as any to hit up a coffee shop and max out on sugar andcaffeine. He’s in a rebellious mood. He could use the pick-me-up.

Even while furiously damp and feeling like 220 pounds of fuck-up, the barista still blushes and stammers her way through his order, so it’s nice to know he’s still got it. Tyler winks at her as he sweeps a five into the tip jar, because hey, ego boost for an ego boost (and anyone in that uniform could probably use one). 

Forty minutes later, and Tyler is recounting every smug senior lecture about how health guidelines are restrictive in order to enable peak performance as he breaks into a caffeine-induced cold sweat under the library’s nausea-inducing fluorescent lights. He’s pretty sure he can hear his own blood rushing through his veins. This is _not_ peak performance. This is, mathematically, the equivalent of what would happen if an average, _not_ Olympic-leaning individual decided to throw caution to the wind and speedball 60 milligrams of cocaine cut with crystal meth, Tyler is pretty sure.

So at first, when two complete strangers start having a Cam and Divya spat at the next library table over, Tyler seriously considers the possibility that he’s undergoing some kind of spiritually significant hallucination, like he’s Joan of Arc or that guy from the X-Men or whomever.

Except the notes he has spread out in front of him are _way_ too detailed to be something his mind conjured, otherwise he’d definitely have bumped his GPA up that one extra percentage to a 4.0 by now, and he’s also pretty sure his subconscious doesn’t have the creativity to come up with the graph paper maze-drawing game they’ve been entertaining themselves with for the entire morning.

“It’s easy,” the little robotic one who’s sitting down insists. “If I can think like you, I can block you. And all _that_ takes is knowing what _I_ wouldn’t do.”

“Idon’t know what you wouldn’t do,” says the other one, who’s hovering over his buddy’s shoulder like there aren’t three other perfectly empty chairs at their table. “You say that like it’s easy, but it’s … it’s Vizzini from The Princess Bride, right? Are you actually reacting to what I’d do? Or to what I think you’d do based on what I might do, or a triple bluff. You don’t know. _I_ don’t even know.”

“But I do,” says the guy sitting down as he turns the paper 90 degrees and scribbles something down. The other guy looks far more delighted to have been outplayed than his friend does for actually having accomplished it, which is only noteworthy to Tyler because he grabbed his headphones without his mp3 player on his way out and is therefore stuck listening to this conversation with none of the mental focus required to tune it out.

The guy sitting down, Tyler learns — not exactly against his will but not through any particular will of his own, either — is named Mark; his friend says it pretty much every other sentence like he’s the proud mother of a uniquely named child. Mark, on the other hand, is not so forthcoming when it comes to his buddy. From what Tyler can decipher of his high-speed muttering, the guy’s name _isn’t_ Guido but is something in that ballpark, something Italian-sounding. Or maybe Spanish? Tyler’s a little hazy when it comes to the Romance languages. He took Mandarin in high school, sue him.

It does make sense that the guy’s not American, because he’s constantly leaning on Mark’s shoulders or resting his chin on the top of Mark’s head. It reminds Tyler of this time they’d rowed against a team from Argentina, and he’d nearly fought one of their guys afterward for getting up in his space too much (they got drunk together and laughed about it as soon as Tyler realized it wasn’t an intimidation tactic). 

Watching Mark’s friend is like watching a cat try to make friends with a mailbox, Mark allowing each physical display of affection to happen to him with unmoving stiffness.

Tyler does try to turn his attention back to his Macro & Financial Policy notes, hand to God, but once not-Guido takes a seat to start talking about socials, he throws the towel in. Maintaining a social life around Porc and crew is practically his senior thesis at this point. Call it data collection. 

“I didn’t say I think we should skip the party, it’s just, then that’s third AEPi event in a row that I’m missing. I just feel bad.”

“Well don’t. They should be thrilled. You’re infinitely more valuable as a connection now, isn’t that the whole point of joining a frat?”

“I think maybe there’s some, some warm notions about brotherhood and team-building under that header as well— ” the guy trails off like he’s waiting to be corrected.

“Heartwarming. I was the only person who talked to you before you got punched.”

Tyler’s pretty familiar with this brand of territory marking — the geek equivalent of putting your buddy in a headlock just because you know he’ll let you. 

“We aren’t counting Dustin? That doesn’t seem very fair to Dustin.” 

“I count Dustin as an extension of myself.” 

They’re more interesting now that Tyler knows they’re with a club, but he’s still down a name for half the participants in this conversation, so who knows if the name of the club is even going to come up. Recent party-going memories aren’t turning up much, it’s a lot of conversations with a lot of different people to sift through (this is more a point of pride than an inconvenience), but Phoenix and Owl are the ones who poach heavily from AEPi, so more likely than not these guys are with one of them. 

Tyler’s actually hit up a Phoenix event semi-recently; the size of their clubhouse means they’ve never been as selective with their guest list as some of the other clubs. They’ve even been known to reach out to Porcellian members to request attendance from time to time, a You Scratch My Back, I’ll Scratch Yours level arrangement based around two facts:

The Porcellian doesn’t host parties. They host luncheons, allowing for the attendance of one female date per member (Tyler and Cameron have the solid excuse of rowing practice whenever they want to bail), monthly alumni dinners (even if attendance wasn’t mandatory, Cam would enforce it), and the occasional occult-seeming ritual (such as the time they had to kill, roast, and eat a pig under cover of dark, and then everyone woke up with food poisoning the next day)

Any guarantee of Porcellian attendance at an event is practically chumming the waters for the kinds of girls who wouldn’t normally give a Phoenix party a second thought

What with all their Tophers and Trentons and Tuckers and Tripps, Phoenix is probably where Tyler would’ve ended up if not for the fact that he was obviously going to get punched by the club that wanted Cameron, and Cameron had his eyes on the prize. 

It’s probably better for Tyler that things shook out that way anyway. He can network with other club members as a Porc with far more ease than he’d ever have getting the Porcs to give him the time of day if he’d ended up somewhere else. Tyler does alright for himself at the alumni socials, but finding out his family’s “new money status” had made the twins a “wild card selection” hadn’t exactly warmed him to the Porcellian’s gang of immediate members, and the wariness seems very, very mutual most days. 

The lack of involvement in their selection process is certainly a contributing factor as to why Tyler’s closest non-Cameron Porc associate is one of the new recruits. Keaton Blake Christopher Maxwell Rothschild (christened Keebler by one Tyler Winklevoss) waited only until he was safely through the punch process to declare himself a rampant environmentalist. It was a move Tyler had found so brazenly gauche that he’d really had to applaud the kid. Cam’s been kind of a wet blanket about it, but Cam is kind of a wet blanket about a lot of things. Divya thinks it’s fucking hilarious; Keebler will believe anything Divya tells him with a straight face, so he and Tyler have been stringing him along about Div being a member of the crew team for three weeks running. 

There’s definitely some unaccounted for minutes from the Phoenix party where Ty had ditched Keebler to make nice with the social chair’s girlfriend, so _he_ might know these guys, but one first name isn’t much to go on in terms of comparing notes. 

These sophomores, meanwhile, have cycled back from AEPi to wherever it is they’re going to be tonight, so Tyler leans forward, ostensibly to look closer at his notes, and really applies himself to eavesdropping. 

“You’ve already seen most of it anyway, all that’s left of the upstairs halls are, you know, are the private rooms.” 

Oh, that’s gotta be the Phoenix house for sure. 

Mark leans forward with a little half-smile that’d probably be a big, shit-eating grin on a regular person. “And those are?” 

The other guy looks pained. “Probably very unsanitary.” 

“But only probably? You haven’t gone in,” he asks, but it doesn’t really sound like a question. 

“Mark—”

“I’m, what, you aren’t interested in seeing the rest of a house that has crystal chandeliers and Persian carpets?”

“Not when the rest of the house that we’re talking about is the bang stations!”

“Bang stations,” he says again in that question-but-not way of asking. 

“You know what I mean.” 

“I wasn’t asking for the definition. Just ... curious whether you invented that terminology yourself. You should trademark that.”

“ _Mark_ ,” the guy groans, putting his face in his hands.

 _“Eduardo_ ,” Mark mimics, and Tyler thinks _mystery fucking solved_ , then _oh, so not Italian then_.

“If we go off to a private room and then come back, people might,” Eduardo gestures feebly, “might ... get the wrong impression.” 

Tyler thinks, _even for Phoenix, not likely_ , just a second too soon, because Mark sits all the way back in his chair before saying, more to his hands in his lap than to Eduardo, “About what we were doing, maybe. About us, though?” 

Considering who he shared a womb with, Tyler should maybe have been less blindsided by that plainly stated admission. Nonetheless, it catches him so very off guard that his subconscious automatically translates it to Mandarin and back to English as though that might help him understand it better.

“Mark,” Eduardo says again, though more gently this time. Different inflections to the name _Mark_ might as well be its own Romance language at the rate this conversation is going.

“People still ask what we’re going into business together for,” Mark says rapidly, and Tyler assumes it’s a merciful non sequitur until he adds “Business partners don’t really make up the demographic of the First Wives Club, unless Deb Villenueve has some very, very hidden depths.” 

Eduardo looks like he’s trying not to laugh. Tyler can relate, because Tyler has met Deb Villenueve and he can’t say he’s angling for a repeat experience anytime soon. 

“What did Deb do to you, you have such strong emotions about her all of a sudden,” Eduardo asks like he isn’t really expecting an answer.

“What didn’t she do,” Mark says, shaking his head a little like it might make the thought disperse. He barely waits a beat before adding, “You could just kiss me, if that would be more straightforward.” 

_That’s_ a Divya trick if Tyler’s ever seen one, burying something Cam might shy away from within a casual conversation the way their mom used to hide the twins’ antibiotics in ice cream when they were very little. 

If Eduardo says “Mark,” one more time, Tyler is going to dissolve.

“Mark,” Eduardo says, pained, and Tyler puts his head in his hands. “I think … I think that’s enough.”

“I just thought … it’s an alternative to the bang stations, you seemed opposed to that.”

“I think we should come back to this, okay? For one thing, I think that guy right there is listening to us.”

If this were a different type of conversation, Tyler would say nothing, and probably feel a lot more annoyed at them for assuming their sophomore gossip was worth listening to whether he actually was eavesdropping or not. 

But it could have been Cam.

And if it were Cam, he’d probably be up all night worrying about the concept of a complete stranger knowing something very private about him. 

He takes his headphones off with one hand, but he doesn’t look up, because the fluorescent lights are still kind of bothering his eyes and frankly it’s just not worth that sort of effort. 

“Yeah, I can hear you guys, because you aren’t really being quiet, but I don’t, like, care,” he says. “Except maybe about Deb Villenueve launching a business, I would have some concerns about that.”

Mark laughs this nervous, Woody Woodpecker laugh. “You know Deb,” he asks without really asking, the way he’s been doing all morning.

“I know Heather Robins, so I know what I need to know about Deb.”

Tyler looks up in time to see the way Mark lights up. “Oh Heather, I’m friends with Heather.”

“He is,” Eduardo confirms, as though this is a prospect that confuses him greatly.

“But,” Mark squints at Tyler before asking with an actual question in his voice, “how do _you_ know Heather?” 

Tyler almost laughs. They could have a class together, they could just have mutual friends, they could be cousins for all Mark knows. It’s exactly the kind of question someone who isn’t in a fraternity to make friends would ask. Maybe Tyler should introduce him to Keebler. “I’m in the Porcellian, we come to Phoenix events sometimes.” 

Mark blinks at him with the kind of familiar, wide-eyed look that makes No Parties, Only Luncheons worth it. “You’re a Porc,” he repeats.

“I am in the Porc. And I’m kind of hungover and really need to study, so if we could put a pin in this … ” If Cam’s not here to tell him off for being rude, he’s not going to let it bother him.

“I need to get going anyway,” Eduardo says quickly, and Tyler feels kind of bad, because Eduardo still looks pretty wide-eyed and not particularly reassured. 

He stands up, slinging a bag over his shoulder, looking for all the world like he’s about to run for the elevator when Mark reaches for his hand and says “Wait. You forgot something.”

Eduardo doesn’t seem to get it, looking far more confused than wary, but suddenly his eyes narrow. “Not here,” he hisses.

“He said he doesn’t care!” Mark says innocently, locking eyes with Tyler like now it’s Tyler’s turn to say something. But while having a twin may have made him extraordinarily good at reading one person’s facial expressions, Tyler catches absolutely nothing from the look Mark’s throwing his way. 

He is, unfortunately, still staring at Mark in bewilderment when Eduardo mutters, “Jesus, fine,” before reaching over to turn Mark’s head toward him, holding his face in both hands as he leans down to kiss him. Tyler’s pretty sure rapidly turning away because two guys kissed is a bigot move, so he’s stuck there, just waiting for it to end as he looks dead-on. Alas, Phoenix Eduardo appears to be one smooth motherfucker, savoring that kiss the way you’d draw out the first bite of a ripe nectarine. Mark has a white-knuckle grip on his mechanical pencil, and if they didn’t give off such an air of joined at the hip and tonsils since Welcome Week, Tyler would honestly be wondering if that was Mark’s first kiss ever. 

At last, mercifully, it’s over, and Eduardo unnecessarily brushes some very short strands of hair away from Mark’s forehead and says, “We should talk later though.”

“Sure, sure, we’ll talk,” Mark agrees, and at last there is blissful silence. Mark sits by himself for a minute, fidgeting but not doing much else, and if Tyler were having a better morning he might’ve made small talk, found a way to work into the conversation that the track record for Harvard gay couples who got together as sophomores is at least 1 out of 1, but as it is, he’s already contributed more than enough to this situation that has nothing to do with him.

And besides, he’ll probably run into one or both of them again soon. What the hell else are social clubs for? 

**3\. Cameron**

Cameron knows that Tyler and Divya have been talking about him, and he can tell Tyler knows that he knows. And Cameron knows that _Tyler_ knows he knows, so the entire morning walk to the boathouse is just another nauseating twin feedback loop of waiting for the other to talk first when they both know what they’d want to say. 

But something else they both know is that in polite society, even when something unpleasant is obvious, you don’t acknowledge it until you’re given permission. Cameron has known most of his life that he is something unpleasant in the eyes of polite society. The ability to acknowledge it isn’t something he knows how to do anymore; the key is buried, the coordinates are lost. 

Tyler’s finally the one to talk first, because Tyler breaks rules when he wants something badly enough. Cam has depended on that over and over. But all he says is “Three words, seventeen letters. First word: g-x-p. Second word: y-l-y-l-p-x-v. Third word: y-l-y-d-p-x-v.” It takes a second for Cam to even put together what he’s talking about, and that much must be obvious, because Tyler bumps their shoulders and promises, “It’s an easy one. I know you’re out of practice.” 

“Have we even played this since high school?”

“Not since Nantucket, I don’t think,” Tyler says, unusually pensive. And that’s. That’s something, the fact that Tyler was thinking about Nantucket. And Cam understands what it means, and Tyler can see that he does, and they do not acknowledge it.

Coach makes him and Tyler run the stadium stairs instead of rowing, “so your arms don’t pop out of their sockets after what you two pulled yesterday.” It’s a fair consequence — Cameron was not at peak shot-calling form yesterday and deserves to be knocked down a peg — but he could’ve used another grueling run on the Charles to work the rest of his tension out. He spends his morning class burning with restless energy, and a hastily scheduled Porcellian meeting this afternoon means he and Ty won’t even be able to hit the tank until late this evening.

Normally Cam prides himself on his ability to compartmentalize. It’s how he can last through endurance training in the first place. Blinders on, only focusing on the very next stroke, the very next step, never letting the vast expanse of what’s ahead overwhelm him. Cameron never expected to have something like what he has with Divya, and not just because of what he is, but because of _who_ he is. And Divya— 

Every so often, Div will say something like “When I’m a father,” or “Once I’m married … ” that Cameron has always taken to mean their arrangement has an expiration date. Because Cam has worked hard to get to where he is, and Divya has unquestionably worked harder, and they’re both the type of ambitious not to let anything stand in the way of their goals. So when the time comes, they will undoubtedly go their separate ways, and until then Cameron will focus on what’s directly ahead of him. Blinders on, so the thought of what’s coming can’t overwhelm him.

Because even _beginning_ to let his thoughts approach the idea is— 

But he knows he should. And he’ll need to very soon. It’s almost March, and they’ll graduate in May, and maybe this is for the best. Maybe it’s time he and Divya start letting things unravel. 

It’s the last thing to cross his mind when Divya lets himself into their dorm, and for a second it feels like an omen. Divya takes one look at his face, at the fact that he’s sitting on the couch without homework open in front of him or anything to read, narrows his eyes, and says “I’m here, quit freaking out.”

“ _Div_ ,” Cameron says, blinders on, not thinking through what he actually wants to say.

“Don’t talk to me, I’m still pissed at you,” Divya murmurs, curling up sideways next to Cameron on the couch, tucking his sock-covered feet beneath Cam’s thigh. 

It’s— yes, it’s a level of petty Divya’s known to display, but it still feels. Considerate, to have made the trek out to the Quad from his apartment before they’ve even kissed and made up. Cameron wants to kiss him, burns with it, wants to run his thumb over the mole on his cheek, brush the tips of his fingers over his eyebrows and along the bridge of his nose. He wasn’t prepared for how dizzying it would be to get to stake a claim on another person’s body, to get to touch where he wants with familiarity, with partial ownership. He doubts that would go over well right now, a glimpse of what they both need to prepare themselves for. 

It’s not heartbreak, exactly, what he’s feeling. More like sunk cost fallacy. Divya would get that, he thinks. They _lived_ together. There’s a significant amount of information on Divya in his brain that won’t be going away anytime soon. 

And for all that he was careful freshman year not to get involved with anyone he’d want a repeat venture with, he never had the foresight to put the correct emotional barriers in place for his sophomore year roommate, who showed up on move-in day with an unease-inspiring amp, electric guitar, and CD collection. 

“Don’t look at me like that,” Divya had said, good-natured. “I use a rehearsal room, I hate when people can hear me practicing.” And that had been a pleasant surprise, and Cam had thought _so he’s the laid-back, creative type_ , and within two days Divya had proven him so spectacularly wrong that his feelings crept in under the guise of more surprised admiration. Divya was _not_ laid-back. Divya’s four-year plan had put Cameron’s to shame. Divya had a separate leather event-planner for final club groundwork. Divya was gunning for VP of the Entrepreneurship Society as a sophomore (he ended up getting it).

And Divya remembered that Cam mentioned childhood piano lessons that first week, and one afternoon on his way out to use a rehearsal room, said “You should come with sometime. We could jam.” 

Cameron was in no way prepared for what that show of trust would do to him. The practice rooms weren’t spacious by any means, but the ones that housed pianos were especially cramped. There was always a reason to be brushing hands, looking over one another’s shoulders, sitting close on the piano bench to show Divya the way he and Tyler would play one-handed duets, lifting Divya’s wrists, correcting his posture. 

It was overwhelming, the depth of his feelings, and he tried to put a stop to it. He let himself get hammered at a Phoenix pre-punch party and let it slip to Div that he’d never liked girls, that he never would, left it in Divya’s hands to do with that information what he would (except address it — he tried the very next morning, Cam pretended not to remember). 

Except he didn’t withdraw, and if anything, things got— more. Until they were side-by-side in Cam’s bed, each with one end of Divya’s headphones pressed to their ear, listening to a song Divya had been trying to learn by ear. 

“If you tell anyone I listen to pop music, I’m spiking your next protein shake with horse tranquilizers, understood?” He’d warned, holding out his fist for a fist bump. From what Cam could see of his profile, the set of his jaw didn’t look like he was joking, so Cam kept the amusement off his face when he said “I would never,” gently tapping Div’s knuckles with his own.

“Put this one on my mix too,” Cameron said, because he liked it and because Div had been trying to improve Cam’s taste in music their entire first semester.

Divya smacked his arm with the back of his hand. “See, I knew you were gonna be a dick about my music taste.”

“I’m not being a dick,” he promised, a little offended. “Div, I’m not joking. Put it on my mix so I can listen to it in my car.” 

“I will, but you didn’t get it from me. As far as anyone here knows, my favorite musician is Rachmaninoff.” 

“Cross my heart,” he said, and then was compelled to add, “You kept my secret, you’ve more than earned that.”

Divya paused his Discman. “Your secret?” He challenged, turning on his side.

“Yes.”

“Your Phoenix pre-punch party secret?” 

Cameron had closed his eyes then. “Yes.”

There was a noise like he was sitting up. Cameron was glad he couldn’t see his face. “I knew you were lying when you said you couldn’t remember.”

“But you were respectful about it. So, thank you.”

And then.

And then they were kissing, Divya’s forearms bracketing either side of Cam’s face, only pausing to set the Discman gently on the floor so it wouldn’t fall off the bed. 

“This is a bad, bad idea,” Cameron had said, pulling Divya down so he was flush against him.

“I’m getting kind of mixed signals here.”

“I’m _trying_ ,” he’d ventured, with less authority than he was aiming for because Divya’s mouth at his neck was disrupting the blood flow to his brain, “to appeal to your better sense of judgment because I don’t think I can be the one that stops this.”

Divya disengaged only to rest his forehead against Cam’s. “Not gonna work,” he’d said, wry, before showing his hand. “I already let you listen in on me practicing. From my vantage point, this is just backtracking.”

So Cameron gets it. From all standpoints. It was easy, it was practical, it was _advantageous_ , even, to start hooking up with Divya, to make it exclusive, to let it carry on for this long. They enjoy each other’s company. They motivate each other. And he gets why Divya came to see him today, why he isn’t withdrawing yet. They have a good thing going, and it’s far too late in the game to meet anyone else (at least, anyone with this level of mutual trust). Breaking it off— it’s going to sting. 

Divya shifts his feet beneath Cam’s thigh, and it’s not even a conscious movement to move closer, to start running the backs of his fingers up and down Divya’s calf. He can tell Divya’s pursing his lips even with a grocery store paperback covering his face, but he also knows Divya well enough to recognize the trying-not-to-smile set of his eyebrows.

Jesus, he’s fucked.

For want of anything better to do, he starts teasing out Tyler’s cipher in his mind. He’d said it was easy, so he starts at beginner level just to make it last longer. 1A-B, h-y-q. 2A-C, i-z-r. 3A-D, j-a-s. 4A-E, k-b-t. 5A-F, l-c-u. Like rowing, the repetitiveness is easy and comfortable, and the directive of having a task blocks out all minor distractions. It’s why he prefers luncheons and socials to parties and casual hangouts; all the unwritten rules of decorum keep his brain whirring in a way that doesn’t leave room for milder social anxieties. 

Divya, however, has long since moved past the stage where he could be comfortably tuned out, even if they _weren’t_ crammed together on a piece of dorm furniture. Cam is pulled firmly back to the present when Divya begins to murmur in his sleep. He can’t have fallen asleep too long ago, he hasn’t started fidgeting yet, but Cam’s slept with Divya long enough to know that the teeth grinding could begin at any second.

Cam’s up and retrieving the mouth guard case Divya keeps stashed under the twins’ sink before he can think about it, no motivation other than the fact that it’s the considerate thing to do. Divya’s eyes open when Cam settles back down on the couch, but he still seems pretty out of it, squinting suspiciously at the dark blue plastic case when Cam holds it out to him.

“Shit!” He exclaims softly, jerking up suddenly into full alertness. “Don’t you have a meeting? You’re gonna miss it.” 

“Not for another hour,” Cam reassures him, but Divya doesn’t settle back against the throw pillow until he’s checked his own watch first. Cam feels a familiar streak of pride at that, at the fact that that’s just how Divya functions, reliable as ever.

There’s an imprint on Divya’s cheek where he’d had it pressed to the arm of the couch, and affection blooms so suddenly and ferociously in Cameron’s chest it almost hurts to breathe. He wants to run his mouth along the impression, tries to imagine someone else doing the same thing five years from now when Divya’s settled into the sort of charming domestic life men their age are expected to acquire.

Something about it sends Cameron into a tailspin. 

He’d kept the idea of breaking up locked away firmly in a back corner of his mind, but it’s out now, spreading through his freshly-awoken consciousness like an ink spill. Like a bruise. And there’s no way not to associate it with everything about Divya. The way he talks in his sleep, the way he snaps to attention from the moment he wakes up, hell, even the fact that Cam keeps a space for his spare mouth guard in the bathroom; his awareness of Divya has crept into the most vulnerable parts of his subconscious. And in a few months Cameron won’t have any level of claim to the parts of Divya he’s gotten to know so well. He’ll just have to know that Divya’s out there, being reliable, sleeping uneasily and barrelling intensely through his everyday morning routine, without him. For the vast expanse of future Cameron’s been trying so hard not to look at head-on. He’ll have to spend the rest of his life un-knowing what he knows about Divya, everything he likes about him, everything that makes Cam light-headed even after two years together. What the hell, he doesn’t have the endurance training for this. 

“Please don’t break up with me,” he says in a small voice before he can reason himself out of it. It’s somehow less terrifying than staring down the endlessly bleak duration of the rest of his life.

Divya nudges him with his foot, not quite kicking him, but hard enough that he clearly considered it, and Cam’s heart veers dangerously toward words like love. “If I was gonna break up with you because you can’t have an adult conversation, I would’ve done it two years and three weeks ago, dude.” 

“I mean in May. I mean, I know it’s— ” he trails off, takes a breath. Cameron isn’t the kind of person who dives into conversations like this without a script. His mind feels like it’s overheating. “It would be asking a lot of you to, to try to make it work past graduation, but … ”

Divya is making one of the few struggling-to-stay-neutral faces he has in his arsenal. “Was the plan … _not_ to try to make it work past graduation?” 

Cam sits up so quickly his vision whites out for a minute. “Oh. Well, if we’re on the same page, then,” he says briskly, because _god_ if he can avoid drawing this conversation out any more than he has to—

“ _Cameron_ ,” Divya says, throwing his hands up. He looks. Displeased. “I’m sorry, you thought we were breaking up in _May?!_ ”

Cameron’s mind scrambles to find a diplomatic way to convey what he’s thinking. Why the hellis there no social script for this kind of scenario? All those years of etiquette classes, you’d think _something_ would cover this flavor of social fiasco. “It just seemed like,” he ventures, “there was a sort of … status quo, we were maintaining, that would be changing soon— ”

Divya leans in with urgency, one hand on Cameron’s arm. “ _This is what I mean_ when I say us not talking about anything is a _problem_. Jesus, I get that you have twin telepathy with the other guy you spend all your time with, but. What the _fuck_ , man, it’s been two years!” He softens a little when he looks over at Cam. “I— look, I get that when we started … I didn’t know where it was going either, and yeah, when we were living together I figured it probably _was_ just about the convenience, but then you’d come up and visit me over the summer, and you gave me a key to your dorm, and you never _talk_ about anything so I thought I was supposed to be reading the signals,” he says, voice getting thinner and reedier as he goes. He looks like he lost something. He looks— sad. 

Cam puts a hand over where Divya’s is gripping his arm. “I’m sorry,” he says, and he isn’t just saying it to apologize, he’s really, truly sorrowful that he won something he never worked for, that he didn’t _earn_. “Please let me make it up to you.”

“Oh, I’m going to, but Cam, you’ve gotta understand how much this week … does not inspire confidence about us making it work past graduation.” It stings, but Cameron thinks he needs to hear it.

In one of the rare moments that actually does make Cameron consider if twin telepathy exists, Tyler chooses that moment to burst into the dorm. 

“Gents,” he greets, throwing his bag down, taking in the fact that they’re sitting on the same couch with obvious satisfaction as he crosses over to his room. “What’s new?”

“I’m in love with a moron,” Divya whines, shifting over until he’s pressed against Cam, whose brain went offline somewhere after the word “love” and therefore relies on instinct to wrap an arm around Div, pull him in close. Somewhere in the distance he hears Tyler say “I said what’s _new_ ,” and sometime soon they’ll need to get to their meeting, but for now he can stay in this moment, this moment where Divya loves him. 

“ _Cam_ ,” Tyler says, sounding like this wasn’t the first attempt at getting his attention. Cameron has been trying to use the walk over to Mass Avenue to mentally shore up the vulnerable sectors of his consciousness. He knows what they’re going to discuss at the Porc. It’s going to feel personal. And it’s not, and it needs to stay off his face.

“You know they wanna talk about the article, right?” _If twin telepathy is real_ , Cam thinks, scathing, _you are the world’s biggest asshole_.

“Yes,” he says, curt. “I’d assumed as much.”

Tyler spreads his arms dramatically. “I’m not trying to step on your toes, man, but c’mon. We prepare for everything. We should have a game plan.”

“Why are you so insistent on taking responsibility for something that isn’t yours?” Cameron says, trying not to sound like he’s whining and failing a little, which is a nuisance. He rolls his shoulders like it’ll help reset his emotional state.

Tyler inclines his head a little, _I_ said _I wasn’t trying to step on your toes_ , his face says. “There’s more than just you, you know? Divya’s my best fucking friend, man, and you know I still talk to that girl Lilian from Youth Crew, and now there’s those guys from the Phoenix too… ” he says, shrugging, but the point lands, that Tyler is more than simply his brother’s keeper. 

Cam loathes him a little because he’s right, and because he is, once again, pulling at the slack where Cameron leaves it, like he always does. Like how Tyler didn’t stop at getting punched by a final club, he’s getting into at least one of every clubs’ parties by the end of the year, likely with enough time to swing around and go for seconds. It’s the way Tyler is with everything: making friends, talking to girls, trying out for sports teams, networking — when everything you touch turns to gold, why wouldn’t you reach for everything? He’d probably have made every varsity team if Cam hadn’t locked them into crew, would have dozens more friends if he hadn’t been born alongside a perpetual third wheel. Cam networks well at designated social events, but Tyler does it at parties, airports, beaches, rowing events; easy as breathing. It feels like every time Cam’s mastered something, Tyler’s already moving on to the next thing. Being Tyler’s twin means always playing catch-up.

But being Tyler’s twin has also always meant that Cam has an external conduit for everything he can’t say himself. “Alright,” he sighs, and is grateful that Tyler looks less surprised than Cam expected, that Tyler doesn’t think he’s a coward. “I _would_ still prefer not to draw attention to myself,” he says, because for god’s sake, the guys comment on the fact that he never dates often enough, “but if _you’re_ going to speak your mind, I can’t stop you.”

Tyler’s fully grinning now, eager and ready. _I can’t stop you_ is a favorite phrase of his, one of their secret codes. The gentleman’s method of conveying _Take aim, take them all out._

He feels … not better, but more composed at least, when the limestone boar’s head designating 1324 Mass Avenue comes into view, the thrill of casually letting themselves in through the ornate gold and black door never having quite worn off. It’s impossible not to think about Divya as he and Tyler shed their coats in the bike room, the comfortable way he sets up shop at the foot of the stair while he waits for Cam and Tyler, so at ease it makes the newer members glance at one another, unsettled in their own clubhouse. 

“Ah,” Cameron says as his eyes catch and hold on the gold-painted Latin motto above the front door. “Three words, seventeen letters.” _Dum vivimus, vivamus_ — while we live, let’s live.

“Couldn’t even crack it yourself, you _are_ out of practice,” Tyler gloats.

“And you’re irritatingly sentimental,” Cam says after filling in numbers for letters and landing at 8-21. Their birthday, _honestly_. 

Other members begin to file in after them, and it’s fortuitous timing on Tyler’s behalf and less so on Cam’s that Keaton pulls his bike inside just as Roland starts to run his mouth. The lamentably handsome Roland Whittaker has always been the sort of person who makes friends by gaining common enemies, meaning once he comes off one person’s blacklist he’s inevitably made a space for himself on four others. It’s a system that seems to work for him but sets Cameron’s teeth on edge, as he’s never quite sure who has a Roland grievance, or who’s decided to be on good terms for the week because Roland happened to make exactly the right uncouth remark they’d never get away with saying in good company. 

Cameron mostly avoids small talk with Roland, by far the most straightforward way to navigate the complex web of alliances and grudges he’ll have weaved throughout the club on any given week, but there’s no polite way to shake him off with just the four of them in the bike room. He meets Cameron’s eyes like they’re in on something together before sweeping them back toward Tyler and Keaton, the sophomore Tyler has adopted (and regularly subjects to mild bullying by way of Divya), the latest and loudest of the Rothschild family line, who’d made it his personal mission to test the limits of the leeway his family name granted him. 

“How do you think your coal miner great granddaddy would feel about that?” He asks, not incorrect in surmising that Cam finds Keaton’s staunch environmentalism a bit much on the best of days, but going about it with all the delicacy of an ice pick lobotomy. He’s utterly thrumming with irritation, the way all the guys whose families made their fortunes with oil tend to do the moment Keaton steps into the house.

“I wouldn’t know,” Cam says, offering him a tight smile. “I never had the pleasure of meeting him.” 

Roland refocuses his attention, because apparently it’s a reaction he’s after today. “Say, Tyler, you’re our inside man when it comes to the Phoenix, isn’t that right?” 

Tyler glances over with only mild irritation. “You could say that,” he says, like he’s lazily swatting at a horsefly. 

“What I mean to say is, I can only assume you’ll be the man of the hour when it comes to assessing damage control. I’ve heard about their upstairs — I know they have their own little catchphrase for it, but — private rooms? Wouldn’t you say that seems a little obvious in retrospect?”

Ty does turn fully around then, makes a face that screams _This guy, can you believe it?_ at Cam with clear intent for Roland to see, and says “Can’t say I’ve ever thought about it too hard. But I’m just there to have a good time and see my friends, maybe network some before things really get, y’know — ” he makes a vague gesture to indicate some kind of drunken revelry, the specifics of which Cam cannot begin to imagine. And if it’s vague to Cam then it’s certainly indiscernible for Roland, but Keaton laughs to himself, clearly in on it.

And that’s what it all comes down to, really. The shifting alliances among members, the clubs themselves, even getting accepted to Harvard in the first place; it’s all just a more advanced system of in-groups, of two people looking over their shoulder at someone who is always going to be hopelessly, pathetically behind. 

God does Cameron hope throwing his lot in with the Phoenix S. K. puts him in the former category rather than the latter. 

Tyler dismisses himself from the conversation by turning to go, and Roland cuts ahead of him, squeezing past on the narrow staircase, muttering something under his breath that Cameron is perfectly fine with not hearing. Tyler, not one to be outdone when it comes to being utterly juvenile, catches his foot with his own and sends him sprawling, the ancient bannister squealing as Roland catches hold on his way down.

“The _hell?!_ ” he squawks.

“Oh, you should really be more careful,” Tyler murmurs, and Cam’s conversational bearings hit him like a softball pitch.

“It’s an old building,” he adds. His voice gleams from him, practically shines. “You know, that stairwell was built in 1881, this isn’t Quincy House.”

Keaton catches Cam’s eye like he’s waiting for a baton pass. “Historical restoration ranks up into the low millions,” he muses, clucks his tongue. “You’d hate for it to come out of our dues,” he says like he isn’t utterly dripping with old money. 

“That was all you!” Roland hisses, and it takes absolutely no coordination for both twins to reply “Not what I saw,” in tandem, two mahogany voices ringing with authority.

Tyler glances back at Cam, and Cameron thinks _take them all out_ , thinks of Divya, and then steels himself to think of nothing at all. 

It’s an impromptu meeting, so they don’t have to set up the banquet hall and Cameron is hopeful it means they’ll keep things brief, the half-circle of rickety old breakfast room chairs in the billiard parlor looking anything but official. There’s no formal attendance taking or even a real call to attention, aside from Cyrus calling out “Can we bring it together, guys?” three or four times with very little ceremony for the president of the Porcellian Club. 

“Alright look,” Chet finally says, because Chet’s always been more president than VP, as though Cyrus never quite accepted the upgrade in authority when their last club president graduated. “I know this might not seem like anything to you guys, I know the Crimson puts something out like this pretty much every semester, but the Phoenix coming in with a rebuttal this time without consulting any of the other clubs about it was an unprecedented move and frankly pretty unrighteous.”

To Cameron’s right, Elliot Greene, social chair and treasurer, murmurs “Shit, do you have a pen?”

“Oh, I could take minutes if that’s easier for you,” Cameron offers without thinking about it, because he’s never sure what degree of their relationship is friendship and what degree is based on mutual favor-granting.

“I don’t see how the rebuttal changes anything,” Warren Brinkmann says, calm. “If anything that’s gonna pacify people, right?”

“Or it’s going to motivate them to try harder to get a reaction now that it’s worked once,” Chet replies, agitated.

Roland tips his chair back, front legs clear off the floor. “Well, do we have any intel on this chick who wrote it? For all we know she’s just bitter one of the guys in the clubs gave her the runaround. Or they left her on the doorstep at the Fly because she didn’t feel like putting her lipstick on or doing her hair, you see what I’m saying?”

“Mirriam?” Cam cuts in. “I doubt it, that doesn’t sound like her.”

“Oh, do you know her?” Elliot asks nervously, shooting Roland a look that fills Cam with satisfaction, that familiar _don’t upset the heavy hitters_ expression he’s always wearing at alumni functions. It’s a reassuring thing to know where he stands in comparison to Roland.

“She’s _my_ friend,” Tyler cuts in, looking proud of himself for (unnecessarily) shielding Cam from having to explain their tenuous, mutual friend-based connection to this Crimson reporter but sounding for all the world like a little kid who doesn’t want to share.

Clifton Bradford had started talking as the four of them were ducked into this little exchange, and Cameron normally wouldn’t bother cluing back in until he was finished, but he _did_ offer to take minutes before thinking through what that would actually entail, so he simply grits his teeth.

“… the Princeton Dining Clubs, sure, maybe even the Columbia Sachems, but at this rate who is even left standing to uphold tradition anymore? Us and Yale. And do you honestly think the Societies are meeting to discuss cracking under pressure like this?”

Cyrus, whose two older brothers were not just society members but Bonesmen, clenches his jaw.

“We’ve been losing our edge to Yale for decades,” Cliff drives forward, recognizing where he’s gained a foothold. “I mean, hell, they remind us of that Santayana quote every chance they can possibly get, ‘Anyone visiting the two colleges would think Yale by far the older institution—’”

“Respectfully, why the fuck do we dedicate so much effort to trying to be second-rate Yale?” Tyler interrupts, and _that_ catches hold of Cyrus’s attention all right. “This isn’t a historical reenactment society, we’re not here to impress our grandparents, we’re here because we want to _win_. We shouldn’t just be evolving our policy to stay relevant, we should be trying to get ahead of the curve. This is the new millennium. You’re going to have a hell of a time networking in it if your head’s stuck in the nineteenth century. The Phoenix clearly have their eyes forward, and frankly we should be embarrassed we didn’t think of it first.”

“The Phoenix rely so much less on support from their alumni network than we do,” Elliot points out. Cam, taking minutes, isn’t looking at his face, and that makes it hard to get a read on his tone of voice. “Let’s say we do submit a policy change — like the Phoenix has done, like allowing luncheon guests to be female _or_ male — to the democratic process; once it hits the associate members it’s dead in the water.”

“I don’t think that’s our most strategic approach,” Cameron hears his voice saying before he ever gave himself permission to speak. God, he wasn’t planning on doing this. But not backing Tyler would feel like the equivalent of leaving him wounded on a battlefield. “Chet, you said a reactionary policy change makes us look like we’ll bend to anyone’s whims, and you’re absolutely correct. But we aren’t bending if all we’re doing is pointing out that it was already in place. And the newspaper staff never consulted us for the editorial, so they don’t have a way of proving it wasn’t.”

“I’m not sure I follow,” Cyrus says.

“It’s the strategic offensive principle of war,” Tyler supplies. “We’re not bending because they criticized _us_ , we’re criticizing them for assuming we haven’t updated our policy in the first place, and maybe that means they’ll think twice about it next time.”

“And maybe we don’t have it in writing yet,” Cam says, “but this isn’t the type of controversial motion that’s going to divide the room, we aren’t talking about making the club co-ed or anything big, we’re simply notating behavior we’ve all been abiding by anyway. Is anyone in this room going to stand up and say they discriminate based on sexual orientation during the punch process, or would have objected to a member bringing a male date to a luncheon before discussing it this week?”

There’s some shifting eye contact that suggests exactly that, but no one, not Alistair or Donovan, not even Roland, is willing to be singled out about it right now. Cam feels recklessly giddy. This is going to _work_.

“Well, alright, so putting our own statement in the paper would bypass having to go through associate member approval with the alumni, but it’s … it’s very public,” Elliot says, uncertain. “People are going to be looking at us and expecting us to hold up our end. What are we going to do about luncheons, what do we have to show for it?”

At the phrase _hold up our end_ , Cameron can hear his own voice in his head promising Divya he’ll make everything up to him. Divya, who slept on the couch instead of storming home to sleep in his own bed, who put himself through two years of undefined sneaking around with Cameron rather than seeking out someone who could give him more. Divya invested in him, _loves_ him. He deserves everything Cameron can give him. 

“Well, there’s me,” he says, and there’s a breathless moment of silence before Roland’s chair thunks back down to all fours so hard the floor groans. “If I asked my boyfriend to accompany me to our event on the 24th, would that be suitably nontraditional?” 

Cam can see Tyler off to the side trying desperately to meet his eye. He ignores him in favor of maintaining unfazed eye contact with Cyrus, who has clearly been thrown for a loop and is fighting doggedly to keep it off his face.

“I think … I think that everything you and your brother have proposed is very reasonable,” he manages, and Cam does look at Tyler then, who is utterly gleaming like they’ve just placed for the Olympics. “If no one objects, I think we can go ahead and move forward with delegating sections of a letter to the editor from the Porcellian Club as a unit. Oh, and Roland? For god’s sake, what is house rule number three?”

“Respect the house,” Roland mutters, sullen, and across the circle Keaton meets Cam’s eye rather than Tyler’s to grin conspiratorially. Cam allows himself to feel a little pang of fondness. For all that Keaton can’t keep his mouth shut, he’s not a bad kid. And next year, Cam supposes, if he wants to keep throwing himself into more trenches, he’ll at least have Cam’s (beleaguered) and Tyler’s (mayhem-inclined) alumni support in his arsenal.

They do rank among the heavy hitters, after all.

The sight of Divya waiting comfortably in the Bike Room as everyone filters through to get their coats is so welcome to Cam that he’s almost tempted to chalk it up to hallucination, but behind him he hears Keaton tell Tyler “Oh you should just start bringing Divya since you can never get a date.” 

“I don’t have a death wish, Divya’s under Cam’s jurisdiction,” Tyler corrects him, and Keaton says, far too loud, “Wait, it’s _Divya?_ ” 

Elliot pauses on the second-to-last stair. “Oh, you must think I’m an absolutely shit friend,” he says to Cam, and it’s a small effort to look surprised, instead of pleased to find they _are_ in fact friends. “When you said he was your partner I had assumed you were in business together.”

“That’s a very fair assumption,” Cam says generously, as though deceptive vagueness hadn’t been his MO since sophomore year.

He can feel multiple sets of eyes on his back when he reaches the space where Divya is pulling his things together and zipping up his laptop, and for once in his life it feels good to have an audience. The condescension of the other club members — assuming him to be some kind of shrinking violet around girls, even going so far as to give him romantic advice on occasion — simmers just beneath his skin as he helps Divya up. He lets his hand linger after brushing dust off the back of his sweater, trailing down toward his hip and slowly back up to caress his shoulders. 

“We’ve adjusted our policy to allow members to bring male guests to events as well,” Cam explains when Divya looks at him quizzically.

The full implications seem to take a minute to sink in, but Cam watches it register as soon as Elliot walks over with his coat over his arm, reaching out to shake hands. “Divya, right? Elliot Greene. I’ll look forward to seeing more of you this year, you’ve clearly made a very good impression on Cameron.”

“Oh, I’ve worked hard to,” Divya insists, shaking firmly.

As soon as he has both hands free, Divya pulls Cam in close by the lapels of his coat and starts doing up the buttons. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world to be in each other’s space like this, even where people can see them. 

“I didn’t mean that you had to do all this,” Divya murmurs under his breath, as though it’s not glaringly obvious how pleased he is.

“I said I’d make it up to you,” Cam shrugs.

“You’re such a goddamn overachiever,” Divya says, equal parts fond and smug. He doesn’t lean up to kiss him with everyone looking at them, it’s unlikely they’ll ever be that sort of couple, but the look on his face makes it very clear that no one’s going to be sleeping on the couch tonight. 

_I love you_ , Cam thinks, and he thinks Divya can tell, and he thinks Tyler is laughing at him but he doesn’t care at all. He is alive and finally living; in love and finally doing something about it at long, long last.

**2\. Billy**

It’s days like this that Billy tries to remind himself that he _chose_ to live on campus. He didn’t have to, his parents live like twenty five minutes away, a fact which Billy often exploits for laundry, better dinners, and escaping Mark’s all night coding binges around finals week. 

But right now, living on campus just means he’s at the beck and call of his director and stage manager. Which wouldn’t be his ideal anyways, but has gone from not ideal to absolute fucking shit as they continue to spiral through one of the messiest break ups that Billy has ever seen. And it’s not like theatre majors are exactly known for having lowkey mutually respectful break-ups in the first place. 

So honestly it’s a haven of peace and quiet to roll back to his dorm where Mark is doing his Goosebumps-level possessed by the computer routine and Chris and Dustin are arguing about the best order to watch the Star Wars movies when you take into account the prequels. 

“Go find Natalie and ask her!” Billy calls through a mouthful of Takis he’s pretty sure belong to Mark, but he didn’t put his name on them so, you snooze you lose dude. 

Dustin scoffs, pulling on his winter boots, “I already hit up all my psych connections and none of them will introduce me to her, which like, c’mon I’m not gonna be weird about it.”

“That’s probably for the best,” Chris says, and then throws a highlighter at Mark. It hits him in the face and then takes Mark a full twenty seconds to register it, swatting vaguely at the air, highlighter already at his feet.

“Mark,” Chris says, “We’re getting dinner, you wanna come?” 

“Working,” Mark says. 

“You know we’re really going to have to work on getting him up to full sentences before preschool starts,” Dustin says, bundled in his giant puffy coat. 

Chris looks unimpressed,“Billy?” 

“Can’t,” Billy says, flopping onto his bed, “I’ve gotta go do a program run.” 

“I don’t know what that is but uh, have fun?” Chris offers. 

“Oh I won’t,” Billy says, waving them off. He wonders if Mark would really care if he finishes off the bag of Takis, given that he’s probably not going to have time to eat actual dinner. Billy’s own messy breakup earlier this year didn’t even fuck with his life as much as this one, but no if Kenzie and Logan aren’t happy than god forbid anyone else should be. 

Maybe it’s a good thing they’re doing Chekhov. 

Billy’s still contemplating if he’s going to openly steal Mark’s food when Mark seems to realize for the first time that he’s actually there, pulling off his headphones. 

“You’re here,” Mark says, very matter-of-fact, which is about the only way Mark says anything. 

“Yeah.” 

“You’ve just been gone a lot lately.” 

Billy forces himself out of his sprawl, “The show I’m producing opens this week. Remember?” 

“With the horrible couple, I remember.” 

“Ex-couple,” Billy clarifies, “Still horrible. Can I have your Takis?” 

“Oh they’re not mine they’re Eduardo’s,” Mark says, “So no you can’t.” 

Billy’s just not going to mention that he already had some, choosing to focus instead on the much more interesting detail of Eduardo having left food in their room. Or possibly Mark bought it for him? Either way, very intriguing. Billy’s barely been home in the last month, so he hasn’t really been able to track the Mark-and-Eduardo saga very closely, but he knows from Chris and Dustin that they only have suspicions and no concrete answers either way. 

Which is why it really throws Billy for a loop when he gets up to dig through his own pathetic snack collection and Mark turns in his chair to face him, “Do you think it’s weird to get someone a one month anniversary present?” 

“What?” Billy asks, ‘the fuck’ left implied. 

“You dated that guy fall semester, right? Dylan?” 

“Do you mean _Alex_?” 

Mark shrugs, “Yeah. Him.” 

“Well,” Billy says, “I guess it sort of depends.” 

“On what?” 

“A bunch of different things,” Billy says. “You know, it’s complicated.” 

Mark’s hands are scrunched on top of his knees and he looks about five seconds away from busting out a little Nancy Drew notebook. And Billy would love to indulge this, honestly he would, because he is kind of morbidly curious about what the hell has been happening in Kirkland H33. 

But it’s tech week and he’s running on barely any sleep, and Kenzie and Logan both a) know where he lives and b) aren’t above banging down his door to make sure he’s getting stuff done. 

“Look, maybe we can talk about this later?” Billy offers. “I need to go print a bunch of programs and put them together.” 

“Oh,” Mark says, and then tilts his head, “I could help.” 

Billy watched Mark sit in a corner and just observe while himself, Chris, and Dustin struggled to get a couch through the doorway of their dorm for almost fifteen minutes. So this offer is more than a little surprising coming from him. 

But hey, if Billy can get some help with this _and_ find out the dirt on Eduardo _and_ keep Logan and Kenzie off his ass? He’s not going to turn that down. 

Mark doesn’t put a coat on, which is a choice to be sure, since it’s still the cold as balls part of March, but he puts an extra hoodie on top of the sweatshirt he was already wearing, so he looks decently warm at least. 

Billy sort of expects Mark to jump back in immediately with this whole anniversary concept, but instead, when he finally talks he says, “What makes them so horrible?” 

“Who?” 

“The horrible couple from your show.” 

“Oh god,” Billy says, “Where to begin, my friend. I mean. They broke up and she’s stage managing and he’s directing so that’s already a recipe for disaster. I’ve been playing only child of divorce while mommy and daddy use me to send passive aggressive messages to each other.” 

“Not that we were all sipping sangria in a hammock when they were together,” Billy adds. Logan and Kenzie as a couple had meant endless footsie and googly eyes at production meetings, which was annoying sure, but Billy’s a professional, he can handle a showmance. What he couldn’t handle was them ganging up on him the moment he’d try and make even the most constructive of criticisms. Like, for instance, that while _maybe_ Logan really wanted an entire flock of papier mache birds hanging from the ceiling, that as stage manager Kenzie did not have the authority to break the half dozen safety codes it would have taken to get them up. 

At least the divorce had gotten Billy a lot more authority as producer, even if the endless games of telephone were making his life needlessly complicated. He’d picked up pretty quickly that all he really needed to do was convince them that the other party was not totally on board and he’d get all the go-ahead he needed. Ahhh the smell of young Harvard professionalism at work. 

Billy debriefs Mark on all of this as they make their way to Widener, even though Mark is quite possibly one of the worst people Billy has even conveyed gossip to. He never makes the correct scandalized noises, just nods seriously, but Billy’s good at entertaining himself, so it’s fine. Besides, people are way more willing to spill their own information when they feel like you’ve let them in on a secret. 

“This is actually related to your anniversary question in a roundabout way,” Billy says, not lingering on it too hard, “‘Cause Logan and Kenzie went too big too fast and then just totally crashed, and that’s what you need to not do on this one.” 

“So a present is a bad idea?” Mark says very seriously, hands jammed so far into the kangaroo pouch of his hoodie that it looks like he’s trying to break out the bottom of it. 

“No, not necessarily,” Billy says, “You just need to not go overboard with it. No candlelit dinners or ticker-tape parades, you know?” 

“Because that’s what your friends did.” 

“Oh they’re not my friends, we are _colleagues_ at best,” Billy says, pulling the door open for Mark, “But I just mean philosophically they went too big too fast. They broke up over a game of Paranoia. Like the drinking game?” 

Mark looks at him blankly, which. Yeah Billy maybe should have seen that coming given that the only parties he’s ever heard of Mark going to are the ones that AEPi throws, which are a pretty far cry from twenty-seven theatre students packed into someone’s one bedroom apartment kind of parties Billy goes to. 

“It’s just this dumb game where like, you whisper a question to someone and they have to answer outloud and if you want to hear what the question was you drink.” 

Mark makes a face, “That’s a game?” 

Billy shrugs, “Sure. Anyway, that’s not the point. What I’m saying is that Logan and 

Kenzie got way too into their own honeymoon bullshit and then immediately imploded. Whereas if they’d just, you know, felt it out, gone with the flow, they probably wouldn’t have ruined an entire production of The Seagull on their way down.” 

Mark is nodding very seriously as Billy logs into one of the lab computers, “Also if you’re playing Paranoia and someone asks you ‘what’s the funniest thing you’ve ever fought with your girlfriend over’ maybe don’t say ‘when I got jizz in her eye.’” 

Mark scoffs, and it feels more like a judgement of Billy for suggesting he’d say such a thing than of Logan for saying it in the first place. Which feels a little unwarranted based on what Billy heard secondhand from Dustin about Mark’s break up with Erica, but he’s glad Mark has no plans to do something that monumentally stupid, on purpose at least. Though this lovingly given sage advice is maybe why Billy entirely fucks up the print job and ends up with a stack of black and white programs, which are really not doing any favours to the hideous graphic design. 

“Shit,” he mutters to himself, dumping the entire stack into the recycling bin beside the printer, drawing the attention of some guy at a nearby table when they land in the bin with a _thunk_. 

“Seriously? Why not save yourself a step next time and just throw a stack of unused, perfectly good paper straight into the trash. Do you know how many acres of Rainforest we’re losing a _day_!?” 

Dear lord, what is this the sheriff of the computer lab? 

“I recycled it,” Billy says, more confused than annoyed. 

The guy frowns, “You do know there’s a reason recycle is the third R. Reduction is the most important one, but thank you so much for your touching commitment to the stewardship of our planet.” 

Billy gives him a thumbs up, because he knows that given the chance this guy is just going to start stacking his soapboxes and he really does not have the energy for that right now, so he just goes back to his computer and redoes the print job. 

“If this got fucked I’m just having them in black and white and you can make a nice speech at my funeral,” Billy says, logging out. 

“Chris would do a better job,” Mark says, following after him. 

“Don’t delegate your eulogy responsibilities! Chris is all spin, if you say I’m great everyone will believe you.” 

Billy debates going the long way around to avoid L.L. Birkenstock’s, but that just seems kind of pathetic, plus maybe Mark will jump in and defend his honour. Probably not but, you know, a guy can dream. 

“Sweet success!” Billy cries, pulling one gloriously full colour poster off the top of the stack to show Mark. “Here be a pal and hold these for me.” He half expects Mark to push back but he dutifully holds out his arms. 

“I know that guy,” Mark says instead, head jerked over to the guy who chewed Billy out. 

“Wait, him? Seriously?” Billy says, “Oh god, okay he’s coming over, act natural. And for god’s sake don’t throw anything out.” 

“Hey, Mark right?” The guy says, abandoning his computer station with all of his stuff still sprawled out, blatantly ignoring the many warning signs about library theft like only the wealthy can. 

“Yeah,” Mark says. 

“You’re Eduardo Saverin’s uh, boyfriend?” He says it in that weird way straight guys say ‘boyfriend,’ where they hesitate and then speed through it, like they’re trying to say it before someone jumps out from behind a pillar and drags them off to the nearest PFLAG meeting. 

“You’re..” Mark prompts, not even flinching at ‘boyfriend,’ which is news to Billy. He really thought Detectives Moskovitz and Hughes were still on the case, but honestly he’s always the last to hear about these kinds of things. 

Well good for those crazy kids, even if dating Eduardo must mean having to spend a lot of time with assholes like—

“Keaton Rothschild,” he holds out his hand for Mark to shake awkwardly under the stack of programs. “We met at that Phoenix party last weekend? Well, briefly.” 

“Sure, right,” Mark says.

“I’m Billy,” Billy says, after it becomes apparent that Mark isn’t going to introduce him. 

“Uh,” Keaton says, and then turns back to Mark, “Did you happen to see our letter in the Crimson?” Mark shakes his head, “Well, you’ll probably find it interesting. I think it’s really important the final clubs having….solidarity. Don’t you agree?” 

Mark shrugs, and Billy can see this poor rich boy scrambling for a social script that lines up with the pure social brickwall that is Mark Zuckerberg. He darts a glance over to Billy like he might throw him a bone, and maybe in a different case he would have. Sucks to suck dude, shouldn’t have gotten pissy about the rainforest.

“I- um,” Keaton falters, “Well, I better get back to it. But it was nice to see you again Mark.” 

“Nice to meet you too,” Billy says, just to be petty, taking the stack of programs from Mark. 

“So who the fuck was that?” Billy asks when they’re properly out of earshot. 

Mark shrugs with one shoulder, “Some guy from the Porcellian. Total Daddy’s Boy.” 

Billy snorts, “What’d he want with you?” 

Mark shrugs again, already entirely disinterested in a goddamn fucking Rothschild working hard for his attention, brain whirring on to something else entirely. “So. Would gloves be okay?” 

“What?” 

“For a one month gift. Would gloves be okay? Nice ones.” 

“For Eduardo?” Billy says very carefully. 

“Yeah,” Mark says. 

Billy considers this for a moment, and is shocked to find himself impressed. He would not have pegged Mark Zuckerberg as a particularly adept gift giver, but it’s a pretty good idea. Eduardo is basically always complaining about being cold and he cares about fashion, so it's thoughtful, but not overly sentimental. 

“I think that’s a good call,” Billy nods. “When’s your one month?”

“Today,” Mark says. “Kind of.” 

“What are you going to run out and get them right now?” Billy asks, and wonders if he needs to call his mom to let her know he’ll be home for the night. 

“I got them already,” Mark swipes them into Kirkland, “The other day when I got lunch with Heather.” 

“Oh is she the one with the Fran Drescher hair? I liked her.” 

Mark plows on ahead, “But then I thought maybe one month anniversaries aren’t a thing you’re supposed to do if you’re a guy.” 

“I mean, you know Eduardo would be thrilled if you got him a piece of gum.” 

“Well sure, but I can still try,” Mark adds, and honestly this moment of genuine vulnerability would be adorable if this whole thing weren’t backed with the truly jarring sound of Mark’s flip flops thunking wetly up the two floors to their dorm. 

Billy’s about halfway through assembling programs when Eduardo shows up, looking a little wild eyed as he peers into the door of Mark and Billy’s room. He gives a nod to Billy as Mark pulls his headphones off. 

“Wardo,” Mark says, sounding unusually soft and pleased.

“Have you seen this Porcellian letter in the Crimson?” Eduardo says, skipping over any sort of pleasantry, which is a very unusual move for him, pulling out a folded over copy of the newspaper from under his arm.

“No,” Mark says. 

“The Porc just went on the record that they’re allowing gay members.” 

“Okay…” Mark says.

“This is a big deal.”

“If you say so,” Mark agrees lightly and Eduardo goes _cah!_ And unfolds the paper. 

“Mark you need to listen to this— _‘While the Porcellian is proud of its history as one of Harvard’s most prestigious and exclusive student organizations, we were disappointed that the Crimson did not discuss with us our mandates regarding diversity in their recent editorial on Final Clubs. While our member selection criteria is highly rigorous, said criteria has never included anything which would discriminate against potential members on the basis of sexual identity_ — _’_ Mark. Are you listening?” 

“Yeah. Is that it?” 

“No it’s not. _‘Furthermore, we allow members to bring any appropriate guest to_

 _Porcellian functions and events, regardless of gender.’_ And then some members made some statements and stuff, but those were the major parts.” 

The look on Eduardo’s face when he finishes is less akin to witnessing a bunch of snooty Ivy League assholes being Okay With the Gays, and more like he just watched someone kick a puppy. 

“Alright,”

“No. Not alright,” Eduardo says, flapping the newspaper melodramatically

“Well obviously it’s just lip service. I mean you know these people, they’re just trying to keep their reputations ahead of the next initiation scandal. They’re not going to let in any actual gay members.” 

“Yeah that’s what I thought at first too. But they already did,” Eduardo says, voice pitched low and serious, “Cameron Winklevoss came out in one of the student statements. He has a _boyfriend_. The club is backing all of this, they’re making him poster boy.” 

Billy tries not to snort, where the fuck do they come up with these _names_. Rich people are on a whole fucking other level. 

Mark blinks unphased, twirling a red vine between his fingers, “Who?” 

“Cameron Winkle—he’s in the Porcellian. Very tall. Rows crew. His _brother_ was the guy who saw us— at the library Mark.” 

“Who?” 

“The one who was friends with Heather.” 

“Oh. Him. Well that explains things I guess. He was very chill.” 

“Mark that’s not the point.” 

Mark blinks at Eduardo, because he’s not going to _ask_ what the point is. 

“I think this is our fault,” Eduardo says, very small, practically folding into himself as he collapses onto the edge of Mark’s bed. “We forced— he came out publicly Mark. In the _Crimson_. That wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t—if I had just—” 

Mark does this thing sometimes when he’s coming out of whatever tippity tappity keyboard magic programmers do where he sort of awkwardly jolts back to the same plane of existence as everyone else. Like trying to focus the lens of a camera, blurry and awkward and then suddenly _there_. Billy sees it happen often enough to recognize the way Mark comes back into focus now. 

“Wardo,” Mark says, leaning forward a little in his desk chair and putting both his hands on Eduardo’s legs, just above the knee. “Everything’s going to be fine.” 

Eduardo looks like he wants to argue back for a second, before dissolving like a goddamn sugar cube.“It just got so big so fast.” 

“And it’s going to get old even faster. Some frat will do something stupid, we’ll win a big sport, the coverage wheel will turn and in three weeks? Wardo no one is going to give a fuck about any of this. And I think Winkle-Whatshisface came out of this pretty okay when you think about it.”

“You’re probably right,” Eduardo says, reaching down and covering Mark’s hands with his own. 

“Christ, you’re icicles,” Mark says, grabbing for Eduardo’s hands and squeezing them. 

“That’s the real reason I keep you around,” Eduardo says, the look on his face entirely betraying the story he’s trying to spin, “Way cheaper than a space heater.” 

Oh Billy should. 

Billy should go. 

Like now. 

He’d been fine to stick around for the drama but this is very quickly turning from domestic squabble into a whole other kind of intimate and Billy would like to not be here for that thank you very much. 

He grabs his stapler and the stack of half assembled programs, detouring through Dustin and Chris’ room into the common room, rather than try and bypass the Mark-and-Eduardo roadblock between him and the door. 

Billy’s wrist is just starting to cramp from stapling when Chris and Dustin come back into the room, laughing about something Billy can barely follow. 

“Sup bro,” Dustin says, nodding at him, “Arts and crafts?” 

“Something like that.” 

“Oh-ho-ho! War-do!” Dustin says, leaning his head into Mark and Billy’s room before Billy can warn him. Chris catches Billy’s throat slash though, pulling Dustin back by the arm.

“C’mere,” Billy stage whispers, gesturing, “You guys never told me that Mark and Eduardo are an official thing, I know I’m never home but c’mon, a guy needs to know what’s going on in his own room.” 

Chris frowns at him, “What?” 

“Mark and Eduardo. They’re using the B-word and everything?” 

“ _Bitch_?” Dustin squeaks. 

“Boyfriend,” Chris corrects, like _yeah duh_ , and then seeming to suddenly realize what he’d said, “Wait, boyfriend?” 

“Yeah!” Billy said, “I mean like, we knew they had sexual tension but if you’d told me that Mark fucking Zuckerberg was going to get his love life together before me I’d have slapped you in the face, for one thing.” 

Chris and Dustin are sharing a very very rapid exchange of glances, “Are you _sure_ ,” Dustin says, “Like what did Mark say, _specifically_.” 

Billy clicks the stapler once, thinking, “Some guy was like oh I know you from the Phoenix and Mark was like ‘yeah I’m Eduardo’s boyfriend,’ or something like that. And then Mark asked me about getting Eduardo an anniversary gift for their one month.” 

Chris whistles low, running a hand through his hair. 

“Sonofabitch,” Dustin says, somehow fond, annoyed, and proud all at once. 

“Wait. But like, you guys knew they got together, right?” Billy says slowly, “I’m the last one to know.” 

Dustin, who looks like a muppet during even the most serious of times, goes full mouth flapping and hands flailing, “No, dude, I mean. We’ve been talking about it, but how could it get that serious and we didn’t know? Billy’s never even _home_.” 

Billy clicks the stapler in his direction, “Rude.” 

“I don’t know,” Chris says, “Maybe you just misunderstood.” 

“Wow thanks.” 

“I’m just saying, innocent until proven guilty.” 

“Guilty of what?” Dustin says, “Playing a little tonsil soccer with Eduardo?” 

“Soccer?” Chris asks while Billy faux gags. 

“Hockey’s not very Brazillian, I don’t know.” 

“Well they call it football not soccer anyways.” 

“If you don’t believe me you can just ask Mark,” Billy cuts in with a shrug, picking up another pre-folded program. 

Chris and Dustin exchange another look, “Yeah that’ll end well.” 

“I mean, isn’t that a part of the roommate contract?” Billy says, “You’re supposed to tell the roommates if you’re bringing someone over in a romantic capacity, so we have the grounds to ask.” 

“Also, it’s _totally_ against the bro code,” Dustin says, chucking his coat onto his bed. 

Chris still looks skeptical, “I don’t know… I mean, if he’s not told us I don’t want to pry.” 

“What does he think we’re going to gaybash him? Two homos and Dustin,” Dustin perks up at his own name like a well trained terrier, giving a little wave. “Rules are rules.” 

“I do really want to know...” Chris says mostly to himself, thinking for a long moment and then turning back, “Alright, fine. If it’s in the contract then I guess it’s fair game. We should wait until Eduardo leaves though.” 

“Obviously,” Dustin says, flopping down onto the couch, staring up at something on his phone, while Chris shrugs and goes to get his laptop, the three of them in companionable clicking-based activity silence for a while. Eduardo doesn’t stay too much longer, which is good, because Billy’s almost done stapling programs and given the choice between going back into his room to get something and staring at the wall, he’d pick the wall. 

“Be cool,” Dustin hisses, and then all three of them look when Eduardo emerges from Mark’s room. 

“Hey guys,” Eduardo says, Mark lingering in the doorway behind him. 

“Hiya,” Dustin says, but Billy’s not really listening, eyes having zeroed in on the gloves that Eduardo was now wearing that he hadn’t been before. Bingo. 

“Mark I’ll text you about the-” 

“-Yeah the alumni lunch, I know,” Mark says, in his usual stiff way, but his eyes are soft and fond. 

“Those are nice gloves Eduardo,” Billy says, because deep down he really is just a little shit who loves to stir the pot. Okay, maybe not that deep down. 

“Oh, um, thanks. They’re new,” Eduardo says, seeming more than a little aware of everyone currently in the common space trying very hard to seem nonchalant while practically staring at him. “Night guys.” 

There’s a smattering of polite goodbyes, but the moment the door clicks closed behind Eduardo, Dustin whips around towards Mark. “We need to talk.” 

“What is this? An intervention?” Mark says wryly, padding in sock feet over to the mini fridge and extracting a Mountain Dew. 

“No,” Chris says. 

“Yes,” Dustin says. 

“Kinda,” Billy says. 

Mark blinks, “You guys really should have coordinated this better.” 

“We’re not trying to ambush you or anything,” Chris says, slowly, “But-” 

“—But we all agreed in the roommate contract,” Dustin cuts in, “That if, or when, any of us were having. You know, romantic type partners over to the dorm, that we’d let each other know and—” 

“Dude are you and Eduardo dating or not,” Billy says and Mark gives him a betrayed little look before cracking open his can. 

“Am I dating Eduardo?” He says evenly. 

“Don’t do that thing where you repeat questions back you know we hate that,” Dustin says. 

“It’s not a big deal if you are,” Chris says, “We just want everyone to be on the same page about what exactly is happening. If you guys are dating that’s awesome, Eduardo’s the best.” 

Mark sips his Mountain Dew thoughtfully, “I know Eduardo’s the best.” 

“You guys keep going to all those Phoenix parties,” Dustin says. 

“So?”

“You got him those gloves,” Billy adds brandishing his stapler accusatorily, 

“I got him gloves as a gift, yes,” Mark says, “Can’t a guy get his friend a pair of gloves, sheesh.” 

“You called him your boyfriend to that guy.” 

“No, I never called him my boyfriend,” Mark says, just a little too fast. 

“Mark,” Chris says in his I’m-Not-Mad-I’m-Just-Disappointed voice. “We just wanna be on the same page here.” 

Mark clicks the tab on his can a few times, “You all think we’re dating don’t you?” 

“I mean, yeah kinda,” Dustin says from where he’s sprawled on the couch. 

“Fine,” Mark says, almost resigned, “Yeah, sure, we’re dating.” 

Billy looks over at Dustin who raises his eyebrows and looks at Chris. “For real?” Dustin hedges, just as their dorm door reopens, all of them swivelling to look at Eduardo who flushes and looks caught. 

“I just forgot my scarf,” he says, practically holding up his hands. “Is everything okay?” 

“I told them the truth, Wardo,” Mark says, very carefully, “About us.” 

“About us?” Eduardo repeats. 

“That we’re dating.” 

“Excuse me?” “I know, I know we weren’t going to tell them but they figured it out and,” Mark spreads his hands, “There wasn’t much I could really say to rebuttal so.” 

Eduardo blinks, and Billy does actually feel kind of bad now. 

“Not that we’re upset!” Dustin interjects quickly, scrambling up, “Wardo no that’s awesome! We’re happy for you guys.” 

“And now we can make sure you guys can have the room,” Chris offers, “If you need some alone time.” Which, alright Eduardo has a single so that idea can blow him, but Billy figures they should probably be on their best behaviour right now. 

“I—” Eduardo says, “Yeah sure, uh, that’s really nice of you to offer.” 

“Here,” Mark says, putting down his Mountain Dew and disappearing around the corner of his room. He crosses back through Chris and Dustin’s room, coming out the other side right beside Eduardo, scarf in hand. 

“Mark,” Eduardo says, in a tone of voice that Billy can’t even begin to decipher. 

Mark doesn’t reply, eyes intense as he loops the scarf over Eduardo’s shoulders. 

“Mark,” Eduardo tries again, and is cut off but Mark leaning up and kissing him on the mouth, almost shyly, Eduardo’s eyes falling shut just as Mark is pulling away. 

“We’ll talk more tomorrow, okay?” Mark offers, which is a pretty big concession for Mark. 

“I— okay,” Eduardo says, sounding a bit dazed. Poor schmuck. 

Mark opens the door for him, putting a hand on Eduardo’s back very briefly before Eduardo’s gone again, a weird silence lingering. Chris darts a guilty look over at Billy, but he shrugs, if Mark didn’t wanna fight the bull he shouldn’t have kissed it. 

“Sooooo,” Dustin says, as always the first one to break an awkward silence, “Mark, can I have one of your Mountain Dews?” 

“Sorry, roommate contract says that all food and drink belongs to the person who bought it,” Mark says, taking a loud sip and not sounding particularly sorry at all as he skulks back to his room. 

“Well,” Dustin says, when he’s gone, “I think that went mostly okay.” 

Chris groans. 

“I said _mostly_!” Dustin protests, and then turns on Billy. “Hey wait didn’t you say you were gonna drop out of Harvard if Mark got a boyfriend before you?” 

“You know what,” Billy says, putting down his stapler. “I think this would be a great night for me to head home.” 

Suddenly, never being in the dorm seems like it might have been a blessing in disguise all along. 

**1\. Katie**

The thing about being Features section head of the newspaper at a school full of know-it-alls, on _top_ of having a racially unambiguous byline, is that you get pretty desensitized to receiving emails from wackjobs.

So Katie Nguyen is unimpressed and unsurprised to see a crop of unread emails from what are _clearly_ throwaway accounts sitting boldly at the top of her inbox when she sits down to work.

Most of the time, she does the smart thing and deletes without reading. For a while last semester she’d thought it was her sacred duty as a journalist to have her finger on the pulse of community response, even if it was hard to read, but _listen_. There was a big difference between a scathing yet constructive critique, and getting called a domestic terrorist for daring to write a review of a Linkin Park album or terrible student production of The Seagull. Like, give her a _break_. 

But if she has to listen to Katie Fletcher and (sigh) Drew Webber over in Sports back-and-forthing any longer about whether (the wrong) Katie needs a ride _home_ or a ride to her _home-away-from-home_ tonight she’s going to start committing random acts of destruction.

The first email she opens is absolutely classic. The email address sounds like it has something to do with World War II, which always bodes well, and the subject line is the succinct and punchy HOMSEXUALS. The body of the email itself is littered with the kinds of spelling errors that are definitely intentional, from someone who clearly doesn’t want to be identified by the way they write. Coward. The gist of the text itself is pretty laughable in its utter conspiracy theory weirdness, claiming Hollywood elites were paying gay and lesbian political operatives to start “infiltrating the masses” and breaking up normal heterosexual marriages, and that it was _clearly_ all out in the open now because one rich crew guy came out in the Porcellian’s letter to the editor a few days ago. The rest of the email is just a handful of copy and pasted photos of random celebrities, allegedly in on this grand scheme, including one of those guys from Lord of the Rings, which makes Katie laugh out loud.

“Hey Mirriam, come look at this,” she calls over the wall of their cubicle. Katie’s more of a romcom girl herself, but every time a Lord of the Rings movie comes out, Mirriam dutifully prints a write-up of all the changes they make from the books. So, Katie can definitely recognize Viggo Mortensen on sight (and knows that Tom Bombadil is a merry fellow with a bright blue jacket and boots of yellow).

“What’s up?” 

Katie tilts her hefty desktop monitor toward her as she comes around the desk. “Your article is bringing all the basement bunker weirdos out of hiding. Just _look_ at this shit.”

Mirriam fully throws her head back and laughs when she sees Viggo Mortensen, which is gratifying, but as she scrolls back up to get to the body of the text, her face goes still and quiet. 

“Oh, this is really awful,” she says softly. “Shit, and he mentions Cam by _name_. Do you think people are contacting him like this? It’s not exactly hard to figure out someone’s student email if you know their name, you know?”

On the one hand, no one knows more than Katie how much it sucks to deal with hatred from random strangers in your email inbox. On the other hand…

“He’s the one who put his full name in the letter to the editor. That was his choice.”

Mirriam sighs, running a hand over her face. “I know, I know, I just. I don’t know, when I was approached to cover that story for the Phoenix, I was mostly just thinking about myself, and how _I_ would feel if an organization I was in wasn’t taking precautions to keep me safe. And I didn’t even think about, like, this person I actually know— and oh my god, is that a conflict of interest? That I wrote something for the paper and Cam responded and he’s a friend of mine?”

The fact that Mirriam is even worried about this makes her 10,000 times the journalist than all the guys who join Features just so they can review their friends’ garage bands and then quit once their pitches start getting rejected.

“Maybe it would’ve been a little dicey if you’d suspected that was going to happen, or if he’d been the one to come to you in the first place, but the fact that he responded to something you wrote isn’t any worse than if Takumi wrote a response to one of your Lord of the Rings reviews in Community Commentary.” 

Shit, Katie really hopes Takumi’s the right guy. Mirriam’s always talking about her boyfriend Takumi and his roommate Divya, or else Divya’s the boyfriend and Takumi’s the roommate? Katie really does not get paid enough to keep track of her staffers’ boyfriends _or_ roommates, so the fact that she has either of these names down at all is frankly above and beyond the call of duty.

Mirriam takes a steadying breath and lets it out. “You’re right, sorry, you’re right. I know I’m being totally oversensitive about this.”

“I don’t think you’re being oversensitive,” Katie says, and she pulls over an empty chair from one of the copy edit computers so Mirriam can sit down. “This was something totally different from the kind of pop culture or campus event coverage we usually do, this is a political, sensitive topic and if it was too far out of your comfort zone, I’ll make sure you don’t have to do something like that again until you’re ready.”

Mirriam nods. “Thanks. I don’t think— I mean, it felt good to write it, I’m actually pretty proud of the finished product. I think I could do something like that again. I think I just freaked out because like, okay, so you know Takumi’s roommate Divya?”

(Oh hell yeah, Katie _is_ on top of her staffers’ personal lives.)

“So Divya and Cam have been dating since like, _forever_ , so he’d always be over at their apartment. And sometimes I’d head over to see Takumi straight from here at, you know, four in the morning or whatever, right when Cam would be leaving for crew. And there was a while where, like, he wouldn’t even _look_ at me when he was walking past me to the front door. I’d be like ‘Good morning!’ and he’d be like— ” Mirriam holds her hands up to the sides of her face, like they’re blinders on a horse, staring straight ahead. “Just, right for the door. Like he couldn’t even acknowledge that I knew he was sleeping over with Divya. And now he’s coming out with his full name in the freaking _Crimson_ , like, that’s so _crazy_.”

“If you ask me,” Katie says carefully, “It sounds like you’ve been a really good friend, and maybe the fact that the first article came from you was helpful, you know? Like, it made him feel more comfortable.”

“Yeah,” Mirriam says quietly. She looks like she’s a thousand miles away, or maybe just a few streets down and a couple years back. In any case, she could probably use a break to get re-focused.

“Hey, did you happen to drive here, by any chance?” Katie asks. Mirriam makes an affirmative noise, so Katie fishes a ten-dollar bill out of her purse. “Could I ask you a huge, huge favor? I am, like, _dying_ for a smoothie. If I covered you for a smoothie, would you mind doing a Juicy trip?”

“Oh you _got_ it, Captain,” Mirriam chirps, and Katie feels _amazing_ about her leadership skills again, mentally adding a point about relieving interpersonal tensions to the resume draft she’s constantly editing in her mind’s eye.

The high she gets from resolving the can of cyber-worms she opened with Mirriam and the wackjob email comes crashing down as soon as Drew and Katie Fletcher cross through Features to get to the staff fridge, being showy and giggly as always. 

“That is totally my tupperware, I can’t believe you’re stealing my tupperware after I shared my takeout with you yesterday,” Katie says, all bouncy energy like it isn’t 7pm on a Thursday.

“If you leave it in my sink and I’m the one who ends up washing it, you have legally signed over its adoption rights. I’m sorry but those are the rules.”

Drew is always saying cute things like that and they’re never to _her_ , they’re always wasted on Katie _Fletcher_ who already _has_ a stupid _boyfriend_.

“Yeah, unless you’re using chopsticks to, to do a rescue mission— ” Katie Fletcher dissolves in a fit of giggling. Ugh.

“That was an act of chivalry! Aren’t girls always complaining about how bras are so expensive? I could’ve left it abandoned in the couch cushions and you would’ve just been a man down until move-out day.”

“Oh my god shut up, shut up, you’re so _loud_.”

If Katie has to listen to one more second of this, she’s going to end up swan-diving into a recycling bin of last week’s issues. 

Instead, she makes the executive decision to open another weirdo email. It seems like the healthier choice.

This one, at least, boasts the unalarming subject line of “Kaitlyn’s Advice Corner Submission”. The fact that it’s from a throwaway email is more intriguing than scary— it’s probably about herpes or something. She opens the message with a spark of gossip-induced excitement.

_Dear Kaitlyn,_

_How do I break up with someone I’m not dating?_

_I am a male junior who is a member of an organization which often hosts invite only events where members are granted plus-ones. Not currently having a significant other, I have been bringing along a friend as my plus-one for about six weeks. Though it quickly became apparent that others believed we were a same-sex couple, I continued to invite my friend on the basis that we knew this was not the case and was not particularly perturbed by the assumption. Additionally, I had assumed over time that fellow members would realize we were merely friends. This has not been the case._

_It has become awkward at this stage to even consider correcting the many people who think we are a couple, especially after steps were made to make us feel welcome. As such I have been essentially forced to pretend I am dating my friend far beyond merely lying by omission, including to our closest friends who have since heard about it. The only way out I can see is to ‘dump’ my friend, but that is complicated by the fact that he doesn’t see any issues with us continuing to pretend to be a couple as ‘we know the real truth.’_

_How can I salvage this situation without hurting my friend or coming off as deceitful to those I’ve indirectly lied to? Do I have an obligation to tell the truth or is it more important to stand by my friend? Help!_

_Sincerely,_

_Embarrassed in Eliot_

What. The hell.

Like, here’s the thing. Katie is a romantic at heart. She actually does want to believe in things like true love, the kindness of strangers, and her role in a historic publication whose contributors include John F. Kennedy. There’s a piece of her that’s tugging at her conscience to take this email at face value. But here’s the other thing. If their readership wanted her undying trust they should’ve earned it, and they didn’t. And John F. Kennedy’s most famous deed after getting assassinated was cheating on his wife, so maybe the Crimson staff is upholding historic tradition after all, just the scumbag kind.

Ugh, ugh, triple ugh. Katie’s really going to need to bring in reinforcements on this one. And she’s certainly not about to wait to bother Mirriam again after how it went last time.

She practically holds her breath walking over to Sports, but luckily for her, Drew’s got headphones on, immersed in some replay of a crew event. There’s an illegible table of scores doodled across his inner arm in ballpoint pen, rubbing off faintly on the cuff of his sweatshirt sleeve. Her heart twists, contracting like she’s tensing up for a shot. When he’d given her his phone number he’d written it on her wrist like that, but so far the only thing he’s called about was to cross reference notes about the Super Bowl back in February, “the perfect conglomeration of sports and pop culture.” 

She taps her freshly-painted pink fingernails on the divider between cubicles, because it makes her feel like a glamorous magazine editor in New York City. “Would you guys mind coming over to Features for a minute so we can have a Katie conference?” 

Katie Stetson’s head pops up from over the divider. When she sits up straight, she’s nearly as tall as Katie is standing up. “Did you say Katie conference?” 

Katie Fletcher is practically bouncing up and down (too bad for her that Drew is still immersed in whatever crew video he’s watching). “Oh we haven’t had one in so long!”

Katie glances over at Katie Fletcher’s cubicle, practically papered over with press photos of pro-athletes and cutesy pictures with her poor, unsuspecting, know-nothing boyfriend.

“Yeah, I know, the last couple months have just been so crazy.” 

It’s not like that’s _not_ true. And look. Katie knows it’s 2004, and she should just chill out a little bit about the whole blatant office two-timing thing. Theoretically she’d kind of get why a girl who loves sports as much as Katie Fletcher would get bored with a guy like Warren from the Porcellian, who only plays golf. And Drew’s a varsity soccer player — Katie _gets_ how there’s more appeal there than Warren Brinkmann and his vampire-pale chicken legs.

It’s just that. The whole thing reminds Katie of the time her high school put on Bye Bye Birdie for the spring musical, and Katie had auditioned for the role of Kim. She’d wanted that role so bad, and spent months getting ready for play tryouts. And then it went to Annie Douglas, who didn’t even appreciate it because she’d had her heart set on getting cast as Rose.

Part of being a competitive person is knowing everyone deserves an equal shot at what you want, but Katie’s so sick of losing to people who are less than heart-set on something she wants more than anything else. 

Whatever. If Katie Fletcher doesn’t have the guts to break it off with her Porcellian boyfriend yet, the least she can do is put her final club expertise to good use.

Katie pulls up the email. “So remember last week how I was running that temporary advice column section for a few issues?” She asks, not wanting to presume anyone in Sports actually reads her section, but they both nod.

“Alright, so somebody clearly didn’t get the memo that that was a temporary feature, and on the one hand this _is_ very relevant to all the stuff we’ve been covering with regards to the final clubs, and this would be a way to keep that conversation rolling, but on the other hand … I don’t know, does this just seem super fake to you?”

She rolls her chair back to give them room at her desk to read through the letter. As much as she’s always a little bit pissed at Katie Fletcher on a low level, she’s still pretty interested to hear her read on the situation. She and Katie Stetson are kind of the closest thing this office has to experts on the subject matter, what with Warren and with Katie Stetson’s whole having-a-girlfriend thing.

“Hmm, the invite-only thing is definitely about one of the clubs,” Katie Fletcher muses, and Katie tries not to feel ungenerously annoyed. But like, _duh_ it is.

“Ohhhhh I see what this is,” Katie Stetson says. “Yeah, wow, this is a, um, very creative hypothetical for all those ‘PC culture is going to go too far’ talking points. ‘Gay and lesbian acceptance is going to ruin the innocent presumption of friendship,’ ‘No one will know what a couple looks like anymore,’ etcetera etcetera, yeah. I don’t buy it.”

“I don’t know,” Katie Fletcher says, resting her chin in her hands. “I know the clubs _are_ pretty worked up about showing that they’re enforcing their new policies now. Like … I don’t know, if you’d gotten this three months ago I’d say no way, but for right now, I think it’s at least plausible.

Katie Stetson catches Katie’s eye and wrinkles her nose, but she doesn’t actually seem annoyed. She and Katie Fletcher are always hanging out outside of their newspaper responsibilities, and it makes sense that they’d have a lot of shared interests and reasons to be spending time together, but it kind of sucks that Katie Stetson only ever does private, in-jokey things with her when she’s annoyed at Katie Fletcher. 

Like, freshman year when they realized there were three Katies on the Crimson staff in the first place, Katie had been _sure_ if any two were going to end up closer, it would’ve been her and Stetson. They were the ones who’d agreed they needed to do something about the name situation, and Katie Fletcher was the one they’d had to work at for a week to get to agree to pick names out of a hat. Because of course she didn’t get it. She was Katie Standard, she was the one nobody thought to use a qualifier for. She didn’t get what it was like to always get referred to as “Asian Katie,” or “ ... Tall Katie” after one of those pauses where it was obvious the person talking had been thinking of saying something else. _That_ was why Katie had ended up using her full name in her byline (Katie Fletcher drew the Kate card, and Katie Stetson got to stay Katie).

“I wanna hear why Kaitlyn thinks it’s fake,” Katie Stetson says. “She’s the advice column expert.” The compliment’s nice, and maybe she’s nitpicking, but the fact that it was delivered to Katie Fletcher instead of to _her face_ when she’s _right here_ just feels so representative of this whole night. Ugh. Whatever.

“So there are three things I think about when I’m evaluating a letter like this. The first thing is, does this scenario seem realistic? And we just covered that, we’re gonna give it a tentative yes for now, but that’s not a firm yes. Second thing — does it seem plausible that someone in this situation would write to an advice column for help about it?” 

“Like, on the one hand, he has a point that this isn’t really the kind of thing you could ask anyone you know about,” Katie Stetson muses, “But on the other hand, this seems like a really identifiable problem. Like, this could only possibly be a handful of people, right? And there’s a lot of identifying information in this email. You know what I wouldn’t do if I were trying to get advice about a personal problem? Sign off with the name of where I live, that’s for damn sure. And then like, this is _Harvard_. People don’t have problems like this for this long, at some point one of them would grow up and lay out what exactly they want out of this situation.”

“That’s true,” Katie Fletcher muses, “and back to being identifiable, I mean, the thing about parties that have invite-only plus-ones really narrows down which club it could be. Like, I bet Warren could puzzle out which club in a heartbeat.”

“Moving on then, since we all seem to be pretty much on the same page about that,” Katie says briskly, “My last point of evaluation is, would somebody in this scenario, writing about it to an advice column, be writing about it _like this?_ ”

Dang, she can tell she lost them on this. It just felt too good to be dispersing expertise. Her brain whirs for a sports analogy, but she barely skims that section, so she comes up short. Bites the bullet. “If _Warren_ were writing an advice column letter, would his writing sound like this? You know? Is this what guys in final clubs sound like?”

“Ohhhhhhh,” Katie Fletcher says, looking amused. “Oh my god, oh my god, yeah let me show you,” she says, and scurries off to grab her Blackberry from her desk. 

“Uh oh, we’ve derailed Drew again,” Katie Stetson says as Drew takes off his headphones. “Now he knows we’re conferencing over here. My money’s on three minutes before he casually comes over here to start flirting,” she says, elbowing Katie.

“Call me a buzzkill, but I think office romances are so unprofessional,” Katie says, maybe a little too snippy, but look, it’s hard to cover up how much she wants to wrap herself in a cozy blanket and listen to Jolene on repeat.

“Sorry,” Katie Stetson says quickly, and she’s quiet until Katie Fletcher gets back. God, no wonder they’re better friends with each other than her. She’s such a social klutz, even when she’s trying with _everything she’s got_ to be breezy and professional and fun and confident. She’s never going to be a glamorous New York City magazine editor at this rate.

“Yeah, okay, look at this,” Katie Fletcher says in an excitable rush, throwing herself back down into Mirriam’s abandoned office chair. She pulls up an email. “Hello babe,” she reads, and Katie Stetson cracks up. “Are you going to the convenience store? I’m out of toothpaste. One or a pack is fine. Your call. Love you. Warren Brinkmann.” 

“Godddd he writes like he’s sending a telegram,” Katie Stetson says, still laughing _so_ hard at the expense of this guy who gets cheated on, like, three times a week right in front of her very cubicle. 

“Are you guys talking about Warren’s robot emails?” Drew pops up from behind the copier.

“Oh my god here he comes,” Katie Stetson mutters under her breath, still laughing.

“Yeah,” Katie Fletcher croons, hugging her Blackberry to her chest. Maybe she’s trying to make him jealous or something.

“He’s such a dork-ass _loser,_ holy shit.”

“I knowww.”

It’s so unfair that this is happening right in front of her face when she can’t even binge her way through the crazy contents of her email inbox first.

“Whoa, hold up,” Drew says, and he pulls a granola bar out of his messenger bag and holds it up to his mouth like a microphone, going into his stupid, old-timey sports announcer voice. “Miss Nguyen, the surface of your workspace is alerting me to an _appalling_ lack of late-night snacks.”

She’s not going to smile, she’s not going to smile, _dammit_ , she’s definitely grinning. “Mirriam’s bringing me a smoothie.”

“Ah, sent on a Juicy Journey.”

It’s not that funny, but she laughs anyway. “Yeah,” she says, articulate as ever, jesus, but Drew’s eyes are smiling when he looks at her.

“Anyone else for a granola bar? The 2am crash is mere hours away, you know that life.”

“Hit me with it,” Katie Fletcher says, and Drew slam dunks it into her hand. 

Katie resists the urge to slap it out of her hand and onto the floor.

Once Drew’s back to his desk, Katie can’t hold it in anymore. She holds Katie Stetson’s _at some point one of them would grow up and lay out what exactly they want out of this situation_ in her heart and blurts out, “Could I ask you a personal question?”

Katie Fletcher puts her chin in her hands. “Yeah, shoot!” 

“So you’re like, so you’re obviously ... seeing Drew now, but like. Is the thing with Warren— are you just waiting for a good time to break it off with him, or does the Porcellian just have really good networking opportunities, or what.”

Katie blinks at her once, twice, three times. “What?” 

“ _Wait_ ,” Katie Stetson declares, breathless, “You think she’s seeing _who?!_ ”

Katie blushes. “I’m not stupid, okay? I’m not, like, judging, or anything, but I heard you guys talking about how you left your bra at his apartment.” 

Katie Fletcher’s eyes seem to widen in slow motion, and then it’s like motion catches up with her and she’s grabbing Katie’s arm _so_ fast. “Holy shit, holy shit, did you not know Drew and Warren were roommates?” 

Oh.

That’s

Huh.

That makes a difference. 

That makes a difference for sure.

“Um,” she supplies helpfully as her heart slams against her ribcage trying to process this new development. 

“IS THAT WHY YOU HATE OFFICE ROMANCE?” Katie Stetson is _roaring_ with laughter now, but Katie Fletcher’s eyes are big and serious.

“Is that why you never want to talk to me anymore? Oh my god you thought I was _breaking Warren’s heart_ oh my god you must’ve thought I was this icy cold _bitch_.”

“No it’s cool, it’s cool, I mean it’s 2004, you could like do what you wanted, not that that’s, you know, what you were doing,” Katie stammers. 

Fate or somebody must be on Katie’s side at last, because Mirriam pulls everyone’s attention away from this shitshow by showing up with smoothies.

“You didn’t say what you wanted, so I just got you something pink,” she says breezily.

“Aw, like her nails!” Katie Fletcher coos. “Oh wait oh my god _Mirriam_ , you know who sent me pink roses two nights ago?”

“Hmm, was it Tom Bombadil?”

“The merry fellow with a bright blue jacket and boots of yellow?” Katie Stetson finishes, and then adds, “What, I read your section,” when Katie _and_ Mirriam glance over, impressed.

Katie Fletcher does a little shoulder shimmy. “Your friend Cameron Winklevoss, class of ‘04.”

“Aww, oh my god, really?”

She leans forward on the desk. “Yeah so I went to this dinner with him last year for the Porcellian during the punch process, and he was like, a perfect gentleman but he _did_ kind of ignore me once we got in. And my dress looked _so bomb_ , I was like aw, what a waste.”

Mirriam laughs, cringing a little. “God, yeah, he makes such weird first impressions sometimes. I used to think he was a total snob.”

“And like, it was fine, like that’s where I met Warren, but he said he felt bad.” She does another little shoulder shimmy. “But no hard feelings, right?

“ _What_ did Warren do?!” Drew calls over from Sports.

“We’re talking about how he scooped me from Gay Cameron!” she calls back.

Katie Stetson meets Katie’s eye and rolls her eyes again. Katie feels that little pang of second-best in her stomach, and then thinks, wait. She knows what to do about this.

“Hey, so when’s the hockey team playing Dartmouth?” 

“Ahh, next week,” Katie Stetson beams, excited.

“Yes, yes, yes, she’s gonna crush it!” Katie Fletcher beams. “I’m so excited!”

“Oh, are you going?” Katie asks, and Katie Fletcher nods, her curls bouncing up and down. She really is kind of charming, if Katie’s being honest with herself. 

“Could I maybe … come with you guys?” She asks, tentative.

“A Katie Conference on the road!!” Katie Fletcher announces, and Katie Stetson looks honest to god touched. 

“I didn’t even know you liked hockey,” she says.

“Oh, I mean, I don’t really get it, but— ”

“Drew can fill you in in the car, don’t worry.”

“Oh, hey speaking of Drew,” Katie Stetson says, her voice low, “I know I was teasing you earlier about how he has a crush on you, but if he’s bothering you I can totally talk to him.”

Katie wills herself not to blush, wills herself not to blush, _dammit_. “He has a crush on me?” She squeaks.

“Oh, _girl_ ,” Katie Fletcher beams conspiratorially. “We have so much work to do before the Dartmouth game.”

Once everyone’s settled back to their sections and Katie can take a moment to process what just happened, she clears through her unread emails with a newfound sense of purpose. The advice column letter doesn’t even need a second glance-over, they’ll just run some bold print in corrections reminding their readers that that feature was a temporary thing.

Inbox cleared, confidence reestablished, Katie opens the notebook where she writes down all her pitch ideas. 

_How to ask for what you want: asserting yourself in the workplace_ and _in your personal life_

Because hey; what’s the point of newfound expertise if you’re not gonna share it?

**0\. Mark**

Mark is buying Raisinets at the convenience store and he’s on top of the fucking world. 

Generally speaking, things tend to work out the way Mark would like them to. He’s always been acing his classes, and even the professors that don’t “like” him grudgingly respect him, which is better than being liked anyway. He’s always gotten on well with his roommates, and they’re better than ever now that they all think he’s gay, which he didn’t see coming but probably should have predicted what with the demographics. And yeah, things had gone south with Erica, but he’s so far beyond her at this point that’s barely a footnote in the story. If anything, their break up had been the biggest step to success so far. If he was still with Erica, none of the work he’d been doing for the past two months would have been possible. Losing Erica meant making space for Eduardo. And that’s been his best win yet. 

It’s like there’s nowhere he _can’t_ go anymore, nothing he can’t do. People know him by name everywhere he goes. They want to talk to him for the sake of talking to him, so they can tell people they talked to him. Of course, Mark knows it’s all out of a desperate need to seem tolerant, to be as accepting as the formalities of the campus Final Clubs are, which is just hysterical if you really think about it. The whole _point_ of the Final Clubs is their exclusivity. They’re off-limits to just about everyone. Students who think the Crimson counts as news think this is a turning point in the conversation because that exclusivity can’t extend to sexuality anymore, supposedly, but Mark knows the truth. This is a turning point in the conversation because Mark was smart enough to undermine the whole thing and get in anyway, without having to be punched _._ Maybe other people got in because the old money idiots in charge took note of them, but Mark got in with nothing but his brain. Even if he isn’t technically a member, he has access to anything that really matters, plus the prestige of being Eduardo Saverin’s _boyfriend_ goes a long way with the right people. 

Which is why, after forfeiting their movie nights repeatedly for the sake of club events, Mark is finally taking Eduardo out properly. It looks better for them if they’re spotted out on date night. Plus, Mark just likes spending his time with Eduardo. Win-win. At least, that’s how Mark sees it, but Wardo had been more reluctant. He’d had to be coaxed into agreeing to go to the movies with Mark, but Mark was willing to put in the work. Hence, Raisinets. 

The walk back to the dorm is nice. Normally, he’s too preoccupied with his thoughts to even notice the weather, but today is bright enough that even he can’t overlook it. As ever, Billy is out, but Chris and Dustin see him off when Eduardo swings by Kirkland an hour later. They’re playing some idiotic drinking game Dustin and Billy had invented the previous weekend. Mark can’t tell who’s winning. Dustin makes a delighted sound when Mark opens the door to reveal Eduardo, waving at him enthusiastically while hanging onto the solo cup of beer in his mouth with his teeth. Mark doesn’t understand him at all. 

“Hey Eduardo,” Chris says, acting like he’s any more dignified than Dustin is just because he’s sipping his beer rather than throwing it back. Eduardo smiles at them both, but his attention is back on Mark almost instantly. 

“Are you ready?” he asks. Mark doesn’t bother answering since he already has his shoes on. “Have a good night, guys,” he tells Chris and Dustin. Dustin waggles his eyebrows at them. 

“You guys have a _good night_ too!” he calls back, before shooting a panicked look at Chris. Chris sighs. 

“He went to that Tolerance Conference the Porcellian sponsored and now he’s paranoid about being homophobic,” he explains. “I’m choosing to blame you both for this.”

Mark just nods, but Eduardo looks pained. They miss Dustin’s defensive reply as Mark closes the door behind him. 

“Did the Porcellian actually have a Tolerance Conference?” Wardo asks in a low voice as they walk out of the building together. Mark remembers his goal to stand closer to him when they’re outside together, just in case. Somehow, despite it going against literally everything he knows, it’s currently in his best interest to appear very much infatuated with Eduardo. 

“It was one speaker in a conference hall, they just wanted it to sound like a big deal,” Mark says, glancing at Eduardo with a wry grin. “It’s like the perfect symbol of what’s going on on a larger scale.”

Eduardo frowns. “What do you mean?”

“It’s all posturing,” he shrugs. “Big fancy words as a front for very little actual effort to include anyone. They sponsored a campus-wide event to show how devoted they are to the cause, get some good press, so then next time one of their members gets caught at a KKK rally they have something to point to.” He reaches into his sweatshirt pocket. “Here.” 

“Oh.” Eduardo takes the offered Raisinets, surprised. “These are my favorite.”

“Why do you think I got them?” he asks. Wardo looks dumbfounded, but after a moment, he stuffs them in his jacket pocket. Mark notes with satisfaction that he’s wearing the gloves Mark gave him again. 

“Thanks.” Mark shrugs again. 

The movie theater isn’t busy when they arrive, but even a crowd wouldn’t have been able to obscure the hulking blue-eyed blonde-haired crew asshole at the counter, one of those Porcellian twins, though knowing the name of this one would do very little to help Mark understand who he actually is. There’s another guy next to him, smaller, rolling his eyes at whatever the douchebag had just said to him. Mark kind of wonders who is using who in the duo, if the other guy is mooching off the rich kid Olympian wannabe or if the twin is actually stealing other Harvard students’ life energy. Or maybe it’s mutually assured destruction. Mark could understand that. 

Whatever the case, the sight of the pair makes Eduardo stand up a little straighter. It’s like he can’t decide how he should be representing himself suddenly, clutching Mark’s arm and stepping farther away from him simultaneously. If Mark remembers correctly, at least one of the twins is gay, so he doesn’t get why Eduardo’s freaking out. The blonde turns then and sees them, zeroing in on where Eduardo is still hanging onto Mark’s sleeve, and he nods curtly at them. Eduardo nods back immediately, so jerky and abrupt that it shakes Mark too. Mark snorts at him acting like a starstruck tourist in Times Square, but he reaches out so they’re properly holding hands at least, throwing Wardo a bone. 

“That’s _Cameron Winklevoss and his boyfriend_ ,” Wardo hisses in his ear. Ah. Mark pulls him in a little closer. It’s ostensibly to show off for someone who is inexplicably the most important gay voice on Harvard campus, but if it reassures Wardo too, well. He needs him in good spirits if they’re going to keep carrying this thing off.

“Hey, Saverin, right?” the guy who isn’t one of the stupidly-named twins (Mark’s pretty sure Eduardo mentioned the name, but Mark has already forgotten) calls. “Eduardo Saverin?”

“Uh, yeah,” Wardo says carefully. He clutches Mark’s hand, and Mark glows. Sometimes, the simple pleasure of having purpose is enough to put up with even the most pointless of conversations in the most public of places. And right now, his purpose is being Eduardo Saverin’s boyfriend. 

“Divya Narendra,” he says smoothly, leaning in closer to the guy that looks more like his bodyguard than his boyfriend. Mark smirks, and Divya notices, raising his eyebrows at Mark. He can practically hear him in his head, _eat your heart out_ , like he won the damn lottery just because he landed a rich boy. Cat that got the cream. Or thinks it did, anyway. Doesn’t-Matter Winklevoss might be in the Porcellian, which is admittedly enticing, but even with his extremely limited exposure Mark can tell that the list of compelling qualities starts and ends there. Clearly, Divya hadn’t known Eduardo when he’d set his mark. 

As soon as the thought crosses his mind, Mark decides that Wardo would never go for someone like him, and this thought allows him to charitably decide he likes Divya Narendra. At the very least, he respects him. 

“It’s good to meet you, properly,” Eduardo says diplomatically, and he’s actually smiling a bit at them. “Cameron, I think we’ve run into each other before.” He’s being _charming_ , more charming than his default Eduardo state already is. He’s actually trying to make these guys approve of him. 

“Probably,” apparently-Cameron agrees. “Congratulations on getting into the Phoenix. It’s a good club.” 

Mark fucking _hates_ So-And-So Winklevoss. 

“Wardo,” he says, not at all sorry to appear impatient. “The movie’s starting in a minute.”

Eduardo seems to shake himself out of whatever spell the guys in front of them put him under and turn back to Mark. 

“Yeah, okay,” he agrees quietly. He nods at the other two again. “Hopefully I’ll see you around.”

“We’ll keep an eye out for you next time the Porc and the Phoenix get together,” Divya says, like a threat. Mark isn’t sure whether to stare him down or kiss Wardo just to make a point, so he does neither. He doesn’t let go of Wardo’s hand until they sit down in the theater, though. 

“So,” he says when they’re settled, the previews still blaring, and he can’t help but grin a little at Eduardo as he asks, “How does it feel to be part of a Harvard power couple?”

He expects Eduardo to groan at him a little, hide his face in his hands or whine at him about how embarrassing the whole thing is or something, reacting in his charming, classic Wardo fashion, taking humility that step further into humiliation. It’s why Mark loves teasing him so much when he knows he has something he can push. He’s fascinating to watch. 

But Wardo doesn’t get self-deprecating or whiny or defensive or anything Mark anticipates. He just bites his lip, drumming his fingers nervously against his thighs before finally saying, “We should talk. About this.”

Mark frowns. “We _have_ talked about this.” They have. Many times. Wardo’s voiced his concerns and his insecurities a billion times, and Mark’s talked him off the ledge a billion more. What they’re doing _works._ It makes sense. 

“ _We_ haven’t talked about anything, Mark,” Eduardo says, shaking his head. He looks antsy, like he can’t decide what to do with his hands. He doesn’t stop looking at Mark, though, even when he has to twist in his seat to do so. Wardo’s never been afraid of eye contact the way other people are. Usually it’s nice, makes Mark feel like he’s actually having an intelligent conversation with someone else for once, but now it’s disarming. “I keep _thinking_ about it, about what we’re doing, what we already _did_...and it’s not like there’s anyone I can talk to about it, either, I was so desperate I wrote this...it doesn’t matter. I mean, jesus, I can barely sleep at night anymore.”

Mark snorts. “Nobody involved with this is worth losing sleep over.”

That just seems to set Wardo off even more. 

“Dustin, Mark. Chris?” He has the tact to keep his voice down, but his whisper is still reaching a furious pitch. “And don’t pretend like you think Heather’s full of shit, okay, I _know_ you’ve hung out with her outside of parties.”

Sometimes Eduardo manages to hollow him out. He reaches in and scoops out whatever Mark’s holding closest to his chest and leaves him scrambling to close the gap before anyone else can tell it’s there. It never stops being unsettling. He has nothing to say to that. 

“And I _know_ this is mostly my fault for letting this go on so long,” he continues, snapping Mark out of his momentary stupor. Dimly, he registers how idiotic the movie trailer currently playing onscreen looks. “I, I indulged you because you were having fun, and it seemed harmless, who’s it gonna hurt, right?” Eduardo’s really gone off the deep end now, half-hysterical while he monologues. Maybe Billy’s theater student energy had rubbed off on him after all the hours he’d spent in their shared room. “But it’s gone too far, Mark, we’ve pushed this way past the point where we should have and I don’t think I can keep doing it. It’s not fair.”

“Not fair to who?”

Eduardo gestures wildly. “Everyone! Our friends, the people out there in the lobby right now that we made _come out of the closet_ , you,—”

“Me?” Mark repeats, baffled. Because if anyone has been coming out on top in the whole situation, it’s Mark. 

“It’s not like this is going to go on forever,” Eduardo reasons, visibly calming himself down to show Mark how rational he’s being. “What happens when you find someone you actually want to date?” 

And that makes something horrible curl in the pit of Mark’s stomach. All he can hear from Eduardo is _What happens when_ I _find someone I actually want to date?_

“If you want out you could have just said so,” Mark says crossly. “I never said this had to be forever. Obviously you’ve already found a girl willing to put up with you _and_ overlook the whole publicly gay thing, so she’s either a saint or has extremely questionable judgement. Actually,” he thinks over the possible scenarios in his head. “If you’re already looking to get serious with someone then that means you’ve been cheating on your boyfriend with her, which definitely won’t look good for The Phoenix after that very formal statement they issued on your behalf.” 

Eduardo looks bewildered. 

“Mark what are you _talking about_ , I didn’t—there’s no one else. There hasn’t been anyone else.” 

The horrible thing in Mark’s stomach is pleased by this. 

“Then what’s the problem? We ride this thing out a bit longer, see how far it takes us, and then we move on. Everybody wins.” The previews are winding down now, the studio logos starting up. Someone shushes them. Mark resists snapping at them.

“I don’t think our mutual friends are going to just ‘move on’ when they think we’ve broken up. They’ll want to talk about it and figure out what happened and expect us to have hard feelings.”

“It could be an amicable break up.”

“Have you _ever_ had an amicable break up, Mark?”

Mark is quiet. Eduardo already knows that one. 

They’re both saved from having to continue the conversation by the movie starting, not that Mark absorbs a single second of it. All he can think about is that Eduardo wants out. All he can think about is how to make Wardo stay. 

Eduardo doesn’t hold his hand while the movie plays. 

“I don’t see why us breaking up now would be any better,” Mark points out as soon as the credits start rolling and the lights come up. He’s defensive now, determined to prove to Wardo that staying together is the smartest course of action and better for everyone. Eduardo blinks at him as the theater grows lighter around them, looking baffled for a moment before connecting Mark’s outburst to their earlier disagreement. “Our friends would still be confused about the whole thing.”

“Or we could tell them the _truth.”_

Mark narrows his eyes. “Is that what you want?” 

Eduardo deflates. 

“No. Yes. I don’t know. I just _know_ we can’t keep doing what we’re doing.” 

The horrible feeling returns. He thinks for a moment how to convince Eduardo that they absolutely can keep doing what they’re doing, that they _should_ keep doing what they’re doing. It’s like his brain is stalled.

“I just want to go home, Mark,” Eduardo sighs. 

“Come back to Kirkland,” Mark insists. He’s not about to let an encounter with two pretentious people challenging them for Harvard’s Best Gay Couple ruin their date night. “Just you and me. I’ll make the guys leave, if that’s what you want.”

“No, don’t do that, jesus. I’ll come over for a minute.” Mark doesn’t push it. He leaves his hand very available near Wardo’s but doesn’t force the issue. He’s learning, slowly. He decides to take a page from Eduardo’s own book. Appeal to his better nature. 

“I know the circumstances are questionable, but I know you’re not totally upset that we accidentally helped diversify Harvard. How many undergrads can say that?” he points out as they walk back across campus together.

Eduardo gives him a weak laugh for that, which isn’t much but which does calm the horribleness a little. 

“I mean, I guess, as much as this whole thing has been a mess, I guess it’s kind of nice, right?”

“Nice?” Mark repeats, and now the feeling in his chest is something else entirely, something he can’t put any kind of name to. It’s good, though, something that wants to reach out and pull Wardo in, too. Like maybe Wardo hasn’t found spending extended time with Mark difficult, or too much, like maybe he’s even enjoyed it a bit like Mark has. 

“I don’t know, people are coming out and living their lives, that’s a _good_ thing. It’s nice. I mean, people are happy for us, Mark,” Eduardo says as he gestures between them. 

And everything comes crashing down again. It's things like this that make Eduardo so infuriating sometimes, because he’s so good and wants to believe everyone is just as good as he is, and it makes him miss things. He won’t think things through critically because he always thinks the best of people. 

“They’re not _happy_ for us, Wardo, they’re just glad that they can feel big next to us,” he says, tripping over his words in his haste to make Wardo _understand._ This isn’t actually a good thing, even if the results have been very productive. He thought Wardo got that. “We aren’t a threat if we’re gay because gay people don’t get to _do_ things. They can be perfectly nice to us at parties so they can feel charitable and look like the good guys, and then write us off completely because we’re not like them and we won’t ever be.” Eduardo’s expression has shuttered off completely. Mark frowns. “What?” Eduardo has stopped cold in the middle of the sidewalk now. Okay. So they’re having this out in the middle of campus, then. He wonders what the Crimson headlines will be like when Eduardo Saverin publicly dumps his boyfriend. 

“Did you think that maybe I thought it was nice because it was good to know that if I wanted to bring a guy to a Phoenix party, the club would have my back?”

“Why would you bring another guy to a Phoenix party?” 

“Mark.” 

Mark’s not proud of how long it takes him to solve the logic puzzle Wardo has presented him: If A=Eduardo bringing guys to parties, Then B=

“You never said anything,” Mark accuses once he gets there. 

“I wonder why,” Eduardo says, angry now. He’s angry so fast, turned on a dime and is _mad_ at Mark when Mark didn’t even _do_ anything except not read his mind. “Maybe it’s got something to do with the fact that you think gay people ‘don’t get to do anything’ and aren’t ‘like’ other people.”

“Well, objectively they’re not—”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” Eduardo says. He turns and continues walking back towards the dorms, not looking back to see if Mark is following. 

“You’re leaving.” 

“Yes,” Eduardo calls back over his shoulder. Mark rushes to catch up with him, matches his pace so they can talk side by side. 

“You’re angry.”

Eduardo laughs. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m a little pissed off. I didn’t...Mark _you_ were the one who wanted to do this. You hassled me into taking you to that party and then you rolled with it, didn’t correct anyone...you said it would work out perfectly if people thought you were my boyfriend because then you could come to more events. I mean _jesus_ Mark, did you plan this?”

“How could I have planned for this? I assume the general population is going to be stupid, but I couldn’t have accounted for this.” 

Eduardo has a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes. Tired. Frustrated. Mark’s fault. 

“I didn’t know it would upset you this much,” Mark offers. 

“I know you didn’t,” Eduardo says, drained, and he stops again. Mark nearly falls over as he belatedly stops with him. “You never do. It’s not your fault I...well. It doesn’t matter.” 

“It matters,” Mark says, and it’s not just to be contradictory. It _does_ matter, suddenly. He doesn’t know why, but he needs him to know. “Wardo. It matters.”

Eduardo glances around them, like he’s just realizing they’re completely out in the open. He looks small to Mark then, even if he is taller. He looks like he’s asking Mark for help. Against all reason, Mark wants to try. 

“I think I’m going to go back to my own dorm,” Wardo says carefully. The _but_ is implied, and Mark finishes the sentence for him. 

“I’ll come with you.” It’s worth it if only for the way Wardo’s answering smile reaches his eyes. 

They don’t talk the rest of the walk back to Eduardo’s single in Eliot. It’s not an angry silence, but it sets Mark on edge all the same because he doesn’t know what’s going on anymore, and that’s the worst feeling in the world. Eduardo lets them into the building and darts up the stairs, glancing back a few times to make sure Mark is still there. Every time he does, Mark feels more and more frozen to the spot, doomed. Every time, he feels like he should be saying something, saying _I’m not going anywhere_ or something equally banal. What the hell has Wardo done to him. 

It occurs to him that in going to Wardo’s place for once, they’ve flipped their roles completely. He’d gotten comfortable with always turning around and finding Eduardo still there with him. It never occurred to him that that meant the opposite was true, too. 

“So you’re gay,” he opens the moment Eduardo shuts the door of his room. It’s probably not tactful—he hears Chris frowning from the building over—but it gets to the point, and clearly, he and Eduardo need to cut through the bullshit here. If they can lay some basic facts on the table, they can figure out what comes next. And Mark can work with Wardo being gay for real. Mark never would have guessed, but it does make their story all the more credible, and maybe Wardo can stop looking like a kicked puppy every time people try to hail him as a gay rights hero for bringing a man to his fancy clubhouse meetings. 

Eduardo shakes his head though, frowning. 

“I mean, not really? I don’t know, I always...but I never really thought it was important, you know, at least not until—” he almost swallows his tongue in an effort to cut himself off. Mark watches him like a hawk and still discerns nothing from his haphazard speech. 

“Until I made you take me to the Phoenix?” he guesses. He might not totally know what Wardo is talking about yet, but he can piece together that much. 

The look Wardo gives him is so helpless that it makes Mark uncomfortable, like he’s experiencing whatever’s making Eduardo look so tired by proxy. 

“Until way before that, Mark.” 

It’s a confession, Mark’s sure of it, but a confession of what, he can’t say. 

“I wasn’t ever going to say anything,” Eduardo adds, and Mark has whiplash. He’s used to leaving people in the dust when he tries explaining things to them, but he swears Wardo _has_ to have left out some key detail here, a decoder ring or something that unscrambles his words, because Mark has no idea what Eduardo’s apologizing for. And he _is_ apologizing. Mark’s certain of that. He’s known him long enough that he knows all of his idiosyncrasies, the ways he expresses his insecurities, the way he shrinks down on himself whenever he’s afraid he’s overstepped. If Mark was very boring, he’d assume it has something to do with Eduardo’s dad, who by all accounts is a real piece of work, but Mark doesn’t care about any of that. He just wants Eduardo to look him in the eye again, like before. 

“Why not?” he asks. Fake it til you make it. He’ll put it together through context clues. 

Eduardo’s frown deepens. “Sorry, did you _want_ me to?” he asks, like he’s accusing Mark rather than looking for an answer. 

For lack of a better response, Mark just shrugs his shoulders and says, “I mean I assumed by now we’d gotten to the point where you could tell me if you’ve made some kind of mistake, we’ve kissed half a dozen times and I’ve heard about all the dumb rituals you went through for the Phoenix.”

He’s trying to keep it light, but suddenly things feel very, very dangerous. 

“A mistake,” Wardo says flatly. Ah. Wrong answer. “No, I can’t tell you when I make mistakes because you make them for me. The mistake was taking you to that party in the first place, or taking you out again, or just not correcting people’s assumptions because maybe it felt _nice_ , Mark, maybe some selfish part of me wanted it a little too much and I was too stupid about you to realize it was only going to get harder and harder to stop.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

And Eduardo does look at him again, finally. He meets Mark’s eyes, and he looks so resigned Mark almost wishes he hadn’t.

“I’d think you’re being mean, but I actually believe you that you have no idea what I’m talking about, even if you’d never say it in so many words.” Mark stays silent, which he hopes suitably acquiesces the point. “Jesus,” Wardo says quietly, to himself more than Mark. Like he’s gearing himself up. What could possibly be so awful he can’t tell Mark? Mark’s seen him do so many stupid things. “Okay. I, uh, I really like you, Mark. I know that’s so, so stupid, but, it’s all I’ve got.”

Mark’s pretty sure he’s experiencing the human equivalent of buffering. 

“Sorry,” he says after a moment. “Run that by me again?”

Eduardo laughs. “All of your best friends are gay, how are you not better at this?” 

“What about Dustin?” Mark can’t help but be contradictory even when his vital brain functions are shutting down. 

“Jury’s still out,” Wardo allows. 

“So you _are_ gay,” Mark clarifies. Wardo looks exasperated. 

“I don’t know, Mark, maybe, that’s not the point.”

“It seems like a pretty important point,” Mark argues. 

“For argument’s sake, we’ll say I’m _kind of_ gay, can you live with that?”

Mark considers this. On the one hand, he’s pretty sure that’s not really what being gay means. As far as he knows, which includes some very drunk conversations with his roommates, being gay is kind of an all or nothing event. But on the other hand...

“Yeah, I get that,” Mark agrees. Cautious. That could mean anything. 

“So my _point_ is,” Eduardo continues, and now he sounds more annoyed with Mark than anything, and god. Fuck. Mark is hopeless. “I can’t keep pretending to be your boyfriend if I’m, if I...” he exhales. “Don’t make me say it again.”

Mark sits back to absorb this. Frankly, Wardo being so cagey and avoidant says just as much as his actual words; maybe even more, considering how reluctant he is to name anything. 

“So you let people think I was your boyfriend, even though I’m not, when that was what you actually wanted in the first place?”

“Jesus, don’t make it sound so sad. I’m not crying myself to sleep or anything.”

Mark bristles; it’s not like he wants Eduardo to cry about anything involving him, or anything at all, but he doesn’t want the concept dismissed so easily either. 

“Well, you’re not running away screaming, so that’s something,” Wardo says, attempting to sound bright about this development. 

“Only morons are afraid of gay people,” Mark says dismissively, because it’s true. This was never about that. “I think most people are gayer than they want to think about, and when people are actually gay in front of them, it makes them uncomfortable because they have to admit things to themselves. That’s why this has been so fun. Your Phoenix friends are all vying for who can seem the most okay with it.”

Eduardo is looking at him funny. 

“When you say ‘most people’...” he trails off, like he’s inviting Mark to finish the sentence. Mark doesn’t. “Don’t play with me,” Wardo says sharply. Mark is startled. “I give you such a long leash, Mark, but don’t do that.”

“I’m sorry,” he says instantly. He’s not sure what he’s sorry for, just knows that he is, sincerely. Thankfully, Wardo seems mollified by the quick apology. 

“I get that this isn’t what you wanted, and that’s fine, but don’t act like you’re better than me for it.”

“I didn’t—” Mark starts and then closes his mouth because _what_ the fuck is he saying? What the fuck is he doing? And now Eduardo is just looking at him, waiting, like he expects Mark to finish speaking, and Mark doesn’t know how to do anything but tell the truth anymore. “I didn’t say I didn’t want it.”

Eduardo blinks. “What?”

Mark shrugs, hot and uncomfortable suddenly under Wardo’s stare. 

“I mean I haven’t...it hasn’t been bad, pretending to be together,” he offers. A smile is dawning on Wardo’s face, and it just makes Mark feel warmer. “So it wouldn’t be so bad if we just...kept doing it, right?”

“No,” Wardo agrees, more unguarded than he’s been in hours. “It wouldn’t be bad at all.” 

Mark will deny that he actually _feels_ his heart thump at that, but maybe he does. 

“I could kiss you, then,” Mark muses. “If we’re dating.” And that’s kind of that. Mark will pick apart the events of that evening at great length later, but right now, that’s all it takes. 

“You could.” So Mark does the only thing that makes sense, and he leans forward. 

_Kiss my ass, Divya Narendra_ he thinks. 

In the end, they wind up back at Kirkland together like they always do. Eduardo looks _happy_ , and it’s insane how much that makes Mark happy too. The others are hanging out when they arrive, even Billy. Eduardo greets them far more cheerfully than he had before their date, and Dustin tosses him a beer. Mark ideally would like to just sequester Eduardo away, keep him all to himself, but after getting to make out with him for awhile before they left Eliot, Mark’s feeling a lot more charitable about sharing him. Is it really sharing if they both know Wardo’s all Mark’s anyway? The more he thinks about it, the more Mark feels sorry for everyone on campus who isn’t him, gay or straight or whatever, because no one else gets to kiss Eduardo like he does. They settle in and watch something stupid that Mark won’t remember anything about tomorrow. All he can focus on is the way Wardo has his arm around him. 

He tries to push for Wardo to stay the night, for once, but Billy is glaring at them both in a way that suggests he has no interest in third wheeling his own bedroom, and Wardo ducks out for the night with the diplomacy they know and mock him for. And maybe love him for too. Maybe. 

“See you tomorrow?” Wardo says hopefully. Mark nods, unable to keep his own smile off his face. Eduardo leans in and kisses him good night. He’s not in a rush. He’s not looking over his shoulder. He just wants to kiss him.

“Night, Wardo,” he says, lingering by the door even after Eduardo has turned around in the hall twice just to wave back at him. Turning to check if Mark is still there. 

“SO,” comes a voice back inside the suite. Mark closes the door and turns to find his roommates, all of whom are very much still in the room and watching him rather than the tv. Chris and Billy have twin wide-eyed expressions. Dustin is bent over the coffee table, his chin resting in his hands. 

“So you guys are like. You really like him,” Chris says, wondering. Mark nods, not sure he can speak at the moment. 

“Is Wardo our new dad?” Dustin asks happily, and Mark scowls. Then something catches his eye. His frown deepens as he examines the inexplicably grayscale picture of Van Gogh's “Wheat Field with Cypresses” that someone had clumsily taped partway up the wall. It might have been there for weeks, or just a few hours. Either way, Mark’s certain he hasn’t seen it before. 

“Golf club?” he asks Dustin, who has tensed at Mark’s observations. 

Dustin lets out a defeated sigh. 

“Yeah, it was the golf club.” 

Satisfied, Mark nods his good nights to a dumbfounded looking Chris and the others, dizzy with the knowledge that he’s traded in his fake boyfriend for a real one, and that it feels better than he ever would have imagined. They’d done this exactly right. They’d cleared the path (albeit inadvertently) before there were actual stakes, and now they get to reap the rewards. Mark has to admit that getting to attend final club events _and_ kiss Eduardo whenever he likes is a much better deal than what they’d had going before. And even if he’s still wrapping his head around the fact that becoming boyfriends is a success, not something to be weaponized, he knows it’s the truth. That being gay, even just a little bit, doesn’t have to close doors, it can open them too. 

Without even really trying, they’ve won. 

**Author's Note:**

> Find us on Tumblr!  
> evol_love (Dustin & Mark) @lesbiantoziers  
> phonecallfromgod (Heather & Billy) @phonecallfromgod  
> and youshallnotfinditso (Cam, Tyler & Katie) @youshallnotfinditso
> 
> Thanks so much for reading and happy tenth anniversary to The Social Network

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Bathroom Confessions of a Six-Foot Strikeout](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29455971) by [youshallnotfinditso](https://archiveofourown.org/users/youshallnotfinditso/pseuds/youshallnotfinditso)




End file.
